Maintenance – Stone Arch Bridges

Improving a Stone Arch Bridge’s Serviceability by Strengthening: Part 2

Here are several ways to strengthen a stone arch bridge, ranging from distributing loads over the arch to relieving the bridge from load altogether.

To determine how to strengthen a stone arch bridge, it helps to understand how it behaves when overloaded in order to understand the forces at play.

Mortarless stone arch bridges need extra care to ensure they are not overwhelmed by foliage and that friction between stones remains high.

A key concern when maintaining a mortarless stone arch bridges is how stones can be worked loose by vibration. There are ways to prevent this.

Stone arch bridges with very insufficient waterway often need a little more care and maintenance than a larger bridge to remain useful.

Scour aprons remain the most effective way to prevent undermining of a bridge structure by hindering the water from directly eroding the foundations.

While many historic stone arch bridges are too narrow by modern traffic standards, there are several viable ways to non-destructively widen them.

The weakest point of a stone arch bridge of limestone is the waterline masonry, for it is prone to disintegrating in water.

Wingwalls can be important to a stone arch bridge’s structural integrity. While easily damaged, numerous ways to repair or replace them exist.

Deteriorated stones in a stone arch bridge are almost inevitably a sign of water infiltrating into the structure and needs to be taken seriously.