Bridge Assessment Guideline: Heavy Vehicles

Austroads' Bridge Assessment Guideline: Heavy Vehicles emphasises risk-informed decision-making for the asset management of road bridges and the management of heavy vehicle access. The emphasis on decision-making, rather than focussing only on the calculation of rating factors or assessment ratios, reflects the multitude of considerations faced by road agencies when making decisions concerning bridges. The Guideline provides assessors and road agencies with a framework to reduce conservatism in the assessment of road bridges for heavy vehicle access, particularly for bridges that do not meet the requirements of AS 5100:2017 or the NZ bridge manual. Where assessments indicate unsatisfactory performance despite in-field evidence to the contrary, the Guideline offers bridge-specific advice for explaining the plausibility check prescribed in ISO 13822:2010 consistent with fundamental engineering principles. In line with its focus on heavy vehicles, the Guideline provides advice and techniques for managing access by these vehicles over bridges. It distinguishes between bridge assessment, which is focused on structural performance, and heavy vehicle access management as related but distinct activities. The webinar outlined the decision making framework as well as provided an overview of the Guideline’s contents.

You can listen to Bridge Assessment Guideline: Heavy Vehicles online on Radio and Podcast. Open the player on this page to stream the available audio.

Bridge Assessment Guideline: Heavy Vehicles is an episode from Austroads: Transport Research and Trends by Austroads.

This episode is 63:57 long.

This episode was published on Oct 24, 2025.

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