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PrefaceStone arch bridges are special technical products in many aspects. Two of the most important aspects are their very long time of usage and their landscape changing capability. First, for more than two millenniums, stone of them are still in use. Most of the stone arch bridges now in use are older than the first century. The only type of structures reaching the same duration of usage are tombs and other religious structures. However, in contrast to those, arch bridges are much more exposed to changes in usage conditions. There exist Roman bridges that were crossed not only by Roman legions but also by tanks in World War II. When most stone arch bridges Besides beauty, the bridges show in a very clear way one of the biggest conflicts of our human civilisation. In the untiring trial to rationally describe all elements of our world, we have seen the limits of this concept in the last decades. Even though arch bridges have been built and used for more than two millenniums, we still face problems in numerically describarch bridges have been part of the human infrastructure system, and some ing their behaviour. Only in the last decades have appropriate tools been were constructed, motorized individual car traffic was yet unknown. This load now has to be borne by these historical bridges. We should probably much more esteem the farsightedness and endeavour of our ancestors, which we often count on nowadays without perception.Or perhaps we do notice as some common attitudes indicate, don't we?
