ABSTRACT
It is now well established that soil-arch interaction has a significant influence on the load carrying capacity of a typical soil-filled masonry bridge. However, the backfill material is typically treated in a rather crude manner in existing masonry arch bridge analysis/assessment procedures. For example, in most mechanism analysis programs the backfill is modelled indirectly, with the amount of live load spreading and the magnitude and form of the passive restraining pressure distribution being specified separately. A major simplification is that both these are typically assumed not to depend on the mode of response of the bridge. Consequently there is a need for improved soil-arch interaction models; high quality experimental data is needed to validate such models.
