Proceedings Article | 17 May 2005
KEYWORDS: Databases, Bridges, Sensors, Geographic information systems, 3D modeling, Visualization, Structural health monitoring, Data backup, Statistical analysis, Data modeling
This paper presents a research on the development of a bridge structural health monitoring and information management system (BSHM&IMS) by utilizing geographic information system (GIS) and other related technologies. Based on the dynamic monitored information from various sensors on a bridge, the status of its structural health can be monitored. One of the major issues in this monitoring process is to handle a huge amount of data-both real time and accumulated historical data. The traditional data processes and management methods cannot fully meet the requirements on data process and management for bridge structural health monitoring. Besides the attribute information, the monitored information of a bridge structural health status is highly related to geospatial location. That is, the monitored information can be referenced to a spatial location, for examples, geospatial locations of bridges, geospatial layouts of various sensors on bridges, three-dimensional models of bridges, and fault points of sensors on maps. GIS technology is therefore applied to manage the information in bridge structural health monitoring. The general framework of BSHM&IMS, which is based on an integration of several information technologies, including GIS, database management system, network and others, will be introduced firstly in this paper. For the implementation of the general design, a prototype of BSHM&IMS has been developed and the major solutions will then be described in details. These functions include design of geospatial database structure for bridges, information processing from various sensors, management of a huge amount of monitored data, visualization of bridge information, illustration of warning information of fault points of sensors on three-dimensional models of bridges, and backup and output of important data according to users’ querying conditions. The experimental results demonstrate that the BSHM&IMS is capable to manage huge amounts of monitored data of bridge structural health, including real time and accumulated historical data, effectively.
