The Effect of Columns Height and Span Number on the Vulnerability of Horizontally Curved Multiframe RC Box-Girder Highway Bridges

Bridges are known to be one of the most vital and vulnerable components of any transportation system. A majority of highway bridges in the world have curved superstructure configurations and also have in-span hinges. The curvature and in-span hinges in multi-frame bridges lead to significant differences in bridge dynamic response during seismic excitations. This paper explores the seismic response of concrete curved bridges with regard to columns height difference and effects of the number of Spans. Five bridges have been studied including: a four-span bridge with equal column height (base model), two bridges with non-uniform columns, a three-span bridge and a five-span bridge. Nonlinear time history analysis are performed based on seven different records. The results show that increasing the height of columns and reducing the number of spans in the bridges with the equal column height lead to increase the peak of columns drifts and seismic vulnerability of bridges.