ABSTRACT
The past decade has witnessed significant research progress towards quantifying the seismic vulnerability of aging highway bridges. However, majority of existing literature assumes deterioration rate to be independent of the repercussions stemming from climate change along the bridge service life. In this regard, recent advances on this topic indicate a potential time-dependent shift in average temperature and relative humidity that may influence the degradation mechanism of structural members. Consequently, the influence of climate change on the seismic fragility of bridges need to be evaluated. This study proposes a framework to evaluate the vulnerability of highway bridges under different scenarios considering earthquake hazard, aging and deterioration, and global warming due to climate change. Results reveal that throughout the lifetime of the bridges, the seismic vulnerability consistently increases due to corrosion deterioration and the effect is further pronounced when the influence of potential climate change is incorporated within the fragility assessment methodology.
