Assessment of masonry arch railway bridges using non-destructive in-situ testing methods

The paper presents methods of inspection and testing for masonry arch railway bridges. An overview of a selection of available non-destructive, minor-destructive and monitoring methods is given and their efficacy for the assessment of masonry arch bridges is discussed. The principles of in-situ load tests are described and a methodology for the assessment of masonry arch railway bridges is shown through case studies. Results of a testing programme are demonstrated where the efficiency of various non-destructive testing methods has been studied. It is shown that non-destructive investigation and non-destructive in-situ load-testing can provide valuable information on the condition of bridges and help verify basic input parameters for structural analysis and assessment. (C) 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.