ABSTRACT
The ongoing operation & maintenance costs regarding physical infrastructure are extremely high and asset owners continue to experience budgetary constraints. One of the biggest challenges is a lack of practical tools and low-cost solutions for structural health monitoring. However, developments in smartphone technologies have opened new opportunities for optimizing bridge inspection including rapid data collection on asset health. Bridge inspectors can use smartphones during visual inspections vastly improving accessibility and efficiency. The Tees Newport Bridge is a vertical-lift road bridge in England. Bridge inspection revealed that the bearing and bearing support steelwork had failed leading to joint displacement and impact on road users crossing the bridge. AtkinsRealis was called to carry out the assessment and evaluate bridge safety. This paper shows how smartphone-based applications were used for scanning, creating 3D photogrammetric models and monitoring of bridge deformations to understand structural response to the bearing failure. To the authors knowledge this is one of the world’s first examples where regular smartphones were used for generating the 3D model of a complex bridge and also for capturing and analyzing structural displacements with mm-accuracy. Low-cost, smartphone-based tools are potentially game-changing with respect to structural health monitoring and asset condition reporting, enabling engineers and clients to manage their assets as efficiently and safely as possible.
