Seismic Performance of a Long-Span Cable-Stayed Bridge under Spatially Varying Bidirectional Spectrum-Compatible Ground Motions

Abstract

Considering the socioeconomic prominence of long-span cable-stayed bridges, it is important to ensure their normal operation after strong earthquake events. To this end, their seismic performance must be based on a proper understanding of the relationship between structural capacity and seismic demand. However, evaluating the seismic demands on cable-stayed bridges is challenging due to relatively long distances between supports and the complex composition of various structural elements. The large dimension in the horizontal direction inevitably leads to incoherent input ground motions at supports, while various structural components such as cables, decks, and pylons make it difficult to define the system’s performance limit-state or capacity using a single index or function. This work presents three main contributions to properly assess the seismic performance of a long-span cable-stayed bridge. First, an algorithm was proposed to generate a set of bidirectional spectrum-compatible ground motions for the multiple supports of a bridge. Second, two performance measures were proposed to quantitatively assess the seismic demands and capacity of a cable-stayed bridge: probabilistic comparison index and axial force-bending moment (PM) safety factor. Third, the impacts of the seismic motions on the long-span cable-stayed bridge were thoroughly examined using eight different scenarios in terms of the three aspects: (1) multisupport excitation, (2) assumed soil class, and (3) wave passage effect. For this purpose, the Incheon Grand Bridge was chosen as a reference structure. This bridge has a central span of 800 m and a total length of 1,480 m. The results demonstrate that the seismic demands of the long-span cable-stayed bridge vary along with different conditions of seismic motions, and the proposed performance measures and ground motion-generating algorithm enable quantitative investigation of the impact of different conditions on the long-span cable-stayed bridge.