ABSTRACT
Natural disasters may significantly affect the functionality of highway transportation systems causing unacceptable socioeconomic losses. With the aim to estimate the instant at which a given damage threshold is exceeded, an approach to calculate numerical exceedance demand rates that considers the cumulative damage due to earthquakes over time is presented. The uncertainties related to mechanical and geometric properties as well as the occurrence of seismic loads are considered. The approach is illustrated on two continuous reinforced concrete bridges designed to comply with a drift threshold equal to 0.002. The systems are located in Acapulco, Guerrero, Mexico. Fragility and exceedance demand rates are estimated for different times of interest. The contribution of cumulative damage in the estimation of both fragility curves and exceedance demand rates over time is discussed.
