Conception of cable-stayed curved deck: the effects of unilateral suspension

Abstract

In systems of suspended cable bridges, the cable-stayed bridges have been widely used because of its capacity to overcome large spans and not require large areas of support during their execution, minimizing interference with existing vehicle flow or overcoming large spans in rivers and channels that require space to the passage of vessels. In addition to this structural advantages, they are aesthetically well accepted by society, valuing the urban space and often making it a landmark. This paper aims to describe the influence of unilateral suspension of decks on the behavior of cable-stayed bridges with curved decks through structural models in order to evaluate whether structural gains or losses are relevant to project considerations. Results indicated that stresses variation in the deck depends not only on the position of the cables and their forces (which depends on the stiffness of the deck), but also on the cable itself and the central pylon.