This study introduces a simplified model for bridge–vehicle interaction for medium- to long-span bridges subject to random traffic loads. Previous studies have focused on calculating the exact response of the vehicle or the bridge based on an interaction force derived from the compatibility between two systems. This process requires multiple iterations per time step per vehicle until the compatibility is reached. When a network of vehicles is considered, the compatibility equation turns to a system of coupled equations which dramatically increases the complexity of the convergence process. In this study, we simplify the problem into two sub-problems that are decoupled: (a) a bridge subject to random excitation, and (b) individual sensing agents that are subjected to linear superposition of the bridge response and the road profile roughness. The study provides sufficient evidences to confirm that the proposed simulation approach is valid with minimal error when the bridge span is medium to long, and the spatio-temporal load pattern can be modeled as random white noise. The latter assumption is verified using a comparative study on a random traffic network. Quantitatively, the proposed approach is over 1000 times computationally more efficient when compared to the conventional approach for a 500 m long bridge, with response simulation errors below 0.1%.

中文翻译：

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承受随机交通负荷的中到大跨度桥梁的简化车桥相互作用

这项研究介绍了一种中型到大跨度桥梁在随机交通荷载作用下桥梁与车辆相互作用的简化模型。先前的研究集中在基于从两个系统之间的兼容性得出的相互作用力来计算车辆或桥梁的精确响应。此过程需要每辆车每个时间步进行多次迭代，直到达到兼容性为止。当考虑车辆网络时，相容性方程式变为耦合方程式的系统，这极大地增加了收敛过程的复杂性。在本研究中，我们将问题简化为两个不相关的子问题：（a）桥梁受到随机激励，（b）各个传感剂受到桥梁响应和道路轮廓粗糙度的线性叠加。这项研究提供了足够的证据来证明所提出的仿真方法在桥梁跨度为中等到较长时是有效的，并且误差最小，并且时空负载模式可以建模为随机白噪声。使用随机流量网络的比较研究验证了后一个假设。从数量上讲，与500 m长的桥梁的传统方法相比，所提方法的计算效率要高1000倍以上，响应模拟误差低于0.1％。