Bridge resources for Technicians (drafting)

[Xav1]

HI All,

We have several very good people helping us with drafting, recently hired, who are new to doing works on bridges. I was wondering if there are any good references or books that I could share with them preferably dealing in a conceptual manner. Some concepts that are particular to bridges from what I see are bridge types, geometry, alignment, levels (every floor for buildings for example being at same level normally vs. deck geometry being controlled by the alignment of the road or rail), transitions from bridge deck to another geometry say at an embankment, etc. Then there are structural and other items of bridge like the superstructure, deck treatment, drainage, bearings, expansion joints, etc.

Even though there are several good bridge engineering books, to swift through all of them is not easily achieved. Similarly even though there are several DOTs with standard drawings and specifications and there are many resources in the internet, often times a good reference for me is when things are laid out in a simple structured manner, where one could take a step back and look through everything at a glance to see what matches one's interest, and then zoom into in detail.

Frankly I myself would appreciate such a book of reference and preferably with a lot of sketches when desperate looking for inspiration for solutions

 

[cmoreride]

IMO one of the best ways to approach this topic is to use examples of previously completed and approved bridges plans for the applicable DOT.

 

[MIKE_311]

Unfortunately in the bridge world, presentation standards are very subjective and vary from agency to agency. The best resources are to look at sample plan sets and to stress the importance of consistency and appearance throughout the plan set. If you are in the US, each DOT will publish Cad standards that will discuss, some more than others, expectations on presentation.

 

[OSUCivlEng]

Agree with cmoreride, give them copies of previously completed plans. They can study these plans to help them understand what is necessary depending on the type of bridge and the client.

 

[Waxwing]

[URL unfurl="true"]https://dot.ca.gov/programs/engineering-services/bridge-design-details[/url]