Live Loading for Long-Span Highway Bridges

Abstract

The live loading used in designing highway bridges of short and medium spans is standardized by various codes, but the selection of a suitable live loading for long spans has been left to the discretion of the designing engineers. The writers have formulated herein a loading suitable for use as a design standard and a system of accompanying allowable unit stresses to provide for repetitions of stress and their effect upon highway bridges longer than 400 ft.