Creep Effects and Stress Adjustments in Cable-Stayed Bridges with Concrete Deck

In construction stages of cable-stayed bridges with prestressed concrete deck, the influence of creep on stresses and strains is extremely important in order to foresee the final patterns of internal forces and displacements. In cantilever construction, the concrete deck can be considered, in each stage, as a continuous beam resting on elastic restraints, which modify with successive additions of new segments, until the last one has been assembled. In these stages stress relaxation in concrete occurs as well as vertical displacements increase. After the last segment is joined to the rest of structure, a stress redistribution begins, due to creep. Deformation and internal force development in construction and service life modify stay stresses such as deck and pylon final profiles. It is necessary to prevent undesirable deformed shape of deck and pylon and to control the final stress pattern of deck and stays. The requested final geometry of the bridge is reached by adjusting stay axial forces during construction. A study is presented in which, by taking into account creep effects, the optimization in terms of deck and pylon deformed shape can be achieved through a sequence of stay force adjustments during construction stages. The presented analysis is based on the theory of aging linear viscoelasticity in order to give a useful tool for the conceptual design of cable-stayed bridges with concrete deck. The proposed procedure allows engineers to design by reducing and avoiding creep effects instead of calculating them with refined models since the first design step.