ABSTRACT
The superstructures of road bridges have to be designed for different impact situations according to DIN EN 1991-2 (2010). There are two accidental load cases, which have to be considered for vehicle leaving the road and either hitting the curb of the sidewalk or the crash barrier system, which is usually mounted onto the concrete bridge cap. Especially the load assumptions for the impact on the vehicle restraint systems have changed within the last two decades and the applied impact loads have been increased significantly. This is because of the increasing demand towards higher containment capacity according to the structural codes. Therefore, new crash barrier systems were developed and were brought to the market, which can transmit higher impact forces into the bridge superstructure. As a consequence in Germany the amount of connection reinforcement of ø12–40 between cap and superstructure required by the codes for the design of new bridges was nearly tripled to ø14–20 in the year 2009 (RiZ-ING 2009).
