Construction and Building Materials 280 (2021) 122490

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Construction and Building Materials

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/conbuildmat

SHM of a severely cracked masonry arch bridge in India: Experimental

campaign and adaptive NURBS limit analysis numerical investigation
Nicola Grillanda a, Gabriele Milani a,⇑, Siddhartha Ghosh b, Bhumik Halani c, Mahesh Varma c
a
Department of Architecture, Built Environment and Construction Engineering, Politecnico di Milano, Piazza Leonardo da Vinci 32, 20133 Milan, Italy
b
Department of Civil Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, Powai, Mumbai 400076, India
c
Hone Structural Health Monitoring (India) Pvt Ltd, Mumbai 400079, India

h i g h l i g h t s

SHM experimental campaign conducted on a multi-arch masonry bridge located in India.

Large longitudinal crack on one of the arches detected with considerable crack width.

SHM monitored with crack growth monitoring and tilting of the spandrels.

Application of two different heavy loads (water tank and hydra crane) located in different positions.

Numerical modelling with advanced full 3D approach with adaptive NURBS FEM in limit analysis.

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: The paper presents some SHM results belonging to a wide experimental campaign conducted on a multi-
Received 27 November 2020 arch masonry bridge located near Mumbai (India), exhibiting a large longitudinal crack on one of the
Received in revised form 19 January 2021 arches and the corresponding advanced numerical evaluations carried out with a NURBS kinematic limit
Accepted 20 January 2021
analysis approach, used to assess the stability of the arch subjected to the passage of heavy traffic loads.
Available online 6 February 2021
The masonry bridge is a three-arch structure built during the mid-19th century by British engineers to
connect Bombay with the inland of the Indian subcontinent. At present, it is characterized by a heavy
Keywords:
state of degradation especially in one of the arches that requires an immediate evaluation of the safety
Masonry arch bridge
Crack growth monitoring
under the passage of traffic loads and possible ideas of interventions to strengthen the structure, in order
Tilting of spandrels monitoring to avoid the propagation of deep cracks along the longitudinal direction. The adopted SHM includes the
Upper bound limit analysis crack growth monitoring and tilting of the spandrels under the application of two different heavy loads (a
Adaptive NURBS approach water tank truck and a hydra crane) located in different positions of the arch. Numerical modelling is car-
ried out with a full 3D approach with NURBS finite elements in limit analysis that takes into account the
pre-existing crack opening and predicts with great accuracy the ultimate loads in different scenarios and
the corresponding active failure mechanisms. From experimental monitoring and numerical simulations
results, it is concluded that the bridge is still safe under the passage of traffic loads, but approaches the
ultimate limit state for some specific configurations of the loads applied. A refurbishment is therefore
needed to avoid any further propagation of the cracks up to collapse.
Ó 2021 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
Most of the existing stock of masonry arch bridges, not only in
India but worldwide, is more than 100 years old. The European
railroad and road networks, for instance, include thousands of
masonry arch bridges, mainly built during the XIX century, that
⇑ Corresponding author.
E-mail addresses: nicola.grillanda@polimi.it (N. Grillanda), gabriele.milani@
polimi.it (G. Milani), sghosh@civil.iitb.ac.in (S. Ghosh), admin@honeshm.com
(B. Halani), admin@honeshm.com (M. Varma).
are still in use [1]. The European railways network has been almost
completely built in one century, from the 1825, year of the first
railway, to the 300 s of the twentieth century. Indian masonry
bridges do not represent an exception and date back to the UK col-
onization: they have therefore more or less the same age of the
European ones, as well as the same technology used in Europe.
Thanks to their massive geometry, the beneficial effect of the back-
fill and the favorable masonry mechanical properties, they proved
to be quite durable with life-cycle costs significantly lower than
those exhibited by bridges made with other materials and tech-
nologies. In addition, several of them belong to the world cultural

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.conbuildmat.2021.122490
0950-0618/Ó 2021 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
N. Grillanda, G. Milani, S. Ghosh et al.
heritage and deserve to be preserved, but at the same time utilized
to their maximum load carrying capacity.
However, the continuous increase of traffic and loads, deteriora-
tion of materials and identification of a variety of defects have
resulted in the recent past in the need for assessment and mainte-
nance procedures for such kind of structures [2–7]. As a conse-
quence, considerable effort to develop reliable structural models
based on a limited number of constitutive parameters has been
made.
The condition of such masonry structures is very variegated,
varying from good to very poor. In this latter case, it is necessary
to establish if the structure is still in an acceptable structural con-
dition to carry the required traffic loads, or the passage of trucks
and cars (in case of roads) must be limited or suspended for the
implementation of rehabilitation interventions.
At present, according to the authors’ opinion and experience,
there is still not a reliable combined experimental and numerical
protocol that ensures the identification of the actual condition of
a bridge without the risk to provide results not truly linked to real-
ity, and therefore owning the necessary predictivity features
needed for practical purposes.
As a matter of fact, before attempting any kind of calculation, it
is worth mentioning that these structures were built basing essen-
tially on traditional rules of thumb.
It would be therefore desirable that any study conducted on the
health state of an existing bridge combines an experimental part --
e.g. Structural Health Monitoring (SHM) and Non-Destructive Test-
ing (NDT) (see for instance [4,8–14]) with advanced numerical pro-
cedures, where if possible the initial state of degradation of the
structure is accounted for.
As far as the numerical analysis of masonry arch bridges is con-
cerned, the literature is certainly superabundant and quite frag-
mented: a full review of the existing approaches is outsides the
scopes of the present paper and the interested reader is referred
to e.g. [15–40] for a detailed discussion. Here it is only worth men-
tioning that such literature ranges from relatively simple limit
analysis 1D approaches where masonry is assumed as a no tension
material to complex 3D Finite Element models where materials
used are very sophisticated and need wide experimental character-
ization for the calibration of the inelastic parameters, as well as an
expertise of the user which is uncommon.
In the specific case of masonry arch bridges, it can be still
affirmed that the most commonly adopted computational
approach remains limit analysis [28,41–47], because easily appli-
cable in common design, fast and able to provide with a certain
accuracy both failure mechanisms and the expected ultimate
load-carrying capacity of the structure, at the same time needing
few information on the mechanical properties of the masonry
material to use.
Computational limit analysis can be combined easily with SHM
to investigate the possible propagation of pre-existing cracks under
the passage of heavy loads. SHM alone can provide information on
the acceptable serviceability conditions, but gives inadequate
information for the purpose of rehabilitation/conservation, where
it is required to stop a further evolution of the pre-existing crack
pattern.
As a matter of fact, by creating a network of few sensors like
accelerometers, inclinometers and other similar devices, it is
indeed possible to collect a significant amount of data containing
important information about the serviceability conditions of the
structure, at the same time giving rather generic hints into the pos-
sible activation of failure mechanisms by the propagation of pre-
existing cracks, which should be then thoroughly investigated with
a suitable advanced numerical procedure.
Masonry arch bridges exhibit, indeed, a complex relationship
with damage. Prior to failure, extensive damage occurs via the for-
2
Construction and Building Materials 280 (2021) 122490
mation of multiple hinges and the prediction of the behavior in
presence of pre-existing damage patterns is one of the main chal-
lenges that the scientific community is still facing with.
The answer to the question if an existing crack pattern is
acceptable or not under operating loads is difficult to provide,
but it is authors’ opinion that a combined approach of SHM and
limit analysis on an already damaged structure can provide an
interesting insight about the level of loading that can be safely
applied without activating any failure mechanism.
The present paper is conceived as an innovative attempt to
combine SHM with a limit analysis approach exhibiting a certain
level of sophistication and able to account for a pre-existing state
of degradation, with the aim of passing from experimentation to
numerical investigation automatically and in real-time. With this
aim, a complex case study is taken into account; in particular,
the authors refer to a SHM (crack growth for the application of
heavy static loads and tilting of the spandrels) carried out on a
three-arch masonry bridge located near Mumbai (India), exhibiting
a large longitudinal crack present on one of the arches, and the cor-
responding advanced numerical evaluations made by means of a
NURBS kinematic limit analysis approach, used to assess the stabil-
ity of the arch subjected to the passage of heavy traffic loads. The
masonry bridge is a three-arch structure built during the mid-
19th century by British engineers to connect the old Bombay with
the inland of the Indian subcontinent. At present, it is characterized
by a heavy state of degradation especially in one of the arches that
requires an immediate evaluation of the safety under the passage
of traffic loads and possible ideas of interventions to strengthen
the structure, in order to avoid the propagation of deep cracks
along the longitudinal direction. The adopted SHM involves crack
growth monitoring under the application of a heavy load (a water
tanker) located in different positions of the arch. Tilting tests are
carried out with a hydra crank and the same water tanker used
for the crack growth monitoring. Numerical modelling is carried
out with a full 3D approach with NURBS finite elements in limit
analysis that takes into account the pre-existing crack opening
and predicts with great accuracy the ultimate loads in different
scenarios and the corresponding active failure mechanisms, pro-
gressively adapting the coarse mesh used by means a meta-
heuristic approach. From experimental monitoring and numerical
simulations results, it is concluded that the bridge is still safe
under the passage of traffic loads, but a refurbishment is suggested
to avoid a further propagation of the cracks.
2. Description of the case-study and applied Structural Health
Monitoring (SHM) scheme
The structure under consideration is a stone masonry arch
bridge situated near Mumbai (India) on road 160, between Khardi
and Kasara, see Fig. 1. The location in satellite map is shown with a
pin, with an enlarged site location in map with a pin and its coor-
dinates taken from Google Maps. This bridge is currently under the
administration of the Public Works Department (PWD) of Thane,
Maharashtra. The bridge exhibits a state of degradation that
requires a SHM plus a possible rehabilitation intervention to secure
safety under the passage of traffic load and if applicable reopen the
standard traffic flow to trucks.
The structure is a stone masonry arch bridge designed and con-
structed by Lieut. Charles Scott of the Bombay Engineers between
1848 and 1858. This detail is found carved over the base stone of
one of the pillars. Primarily black basalt stones were used for the
construction of the bridge. There are cracks below the arches visi-
ble with naked eyes. These cracks may lead to the failure of the
bridge. The geometry of the bridge is provided in Fig. 2.
N. Grillanda, G. Milani, S. Ghosh et al. Construction and Building Materials 280 (2021) 122490

Fig. 1. Stone masonry arch bridge near Mokhavane, India, on Old NH3. Top: Location in India and enlarged location in Google Maps. Center: frontal view of the bridge.
Bottom: given labels to the components of the bridge (Piers, arches, wing walls).

In the SHM carried out, some labels are used to enhance the
explanation. The arched vaults are labelled as Arch 1, Arch 2 and
Arch 3, sequentially going from the Khardi end to the Kasara end.
The piers are labelled as P1 and P2, sequentially going from the
Khardi end to the Kasara end and as shown in Fig. 1 and Fig. 2.
3
East side of the bridge is downstream (D/S) located and west
side in upstream (U/S) position. The Wing wall towards Khardi
end is labeled as Wing wall 1, and the Wing wall towards Kasara
end is labeled as Wing wall 2. Each wing wall has two subparts,
A and B, depending on whether they are downstream (A) or
N. Grillanda, G. Milani, S. Ghosh et al. Construction and Building Materials 280 (2021) 122490

Fig. 2. Plan and elevation of the Bridge from downstream (D/S) side, dimensions of the different elements (in m).

upstream (B) located. Wing wall 1A is shown in Fig. 1 (the other
wing walls are almost identical), whereas drawings of the bridge
(plan view and elevation from downstream) are presented in
Fig. 2. Rise and span of the arches were cross checked using a laser
distance meter, as well as the height of the springing line from the
ground. Measurements were taken for Arch 1 and Arch 2 only, as
4
Arch 3 is not directly accessible from underneath due to the pres-
ence of the river.
The bridge exhibits at least one wide and dangerous crack on
one arch (Arch 1), see Fig. 3 and Fig. 4, plus others of minor rele-
vance, but that still deserve to be monitored to assure the service-
ability of the bridge. The major crack is longitudinal at the soffit of
N. Grillanda, G. Milani, S. Ghosh et al.
Arch 1
Fig. 3. Major cracks present in the bridge and preliminary design of the locations of VWDTs in Arch 1 (left), Arch 2 (centre) and Arch 3 (right). Bottom: VWDT vibrating wire
displacement transducer used.
Arch 1, about 13 m long with a varying crack width ranging from
20 mm to 25 mm. As already mentioned, a Crack Growth Monitor-
ing (CGM) system was implemented only on Arch 1, in order to
understand if the crack is expanding/contracting or not under the
passage of heavy loads and temperature changes. CGM was carried
out only on Arch 1 (despite it was initially planned also on Arch 3),
because affected by the most dangerous crack pattern and because
of the difficulties encountered in accessing the soffit of Arch 3. The
proposed crack monitoring system is shown in Fig. 3.
Vibrating wire displacement transducers (VWDT) were used for
crack growth monitoring, as shown in Fig. 3. Data provided by the
sensors were then stored in a centralized vibrating wire data log-
ger. The installation process is depicted in brief in Fig. 5. The real
challenge was to arrange safe access to the soffit of the arches,
obtained coupling a standard scaffolding system with a cherry
picker. Three VWDTs were installed on Arch 1, two along the lon-
gitudinal direction and one along the transverse direction. Wires of
installed VWDTs were extended to the ground for an easier data
collection (see Fig. 6, where the three installed VWDTs on Arch 1
are also shown).
Another important aspect to study is the tilting of the bridge. A
tilt monitoring system was installed on the spandrels at different
locations. Initially, it was planned to apply a total of 14 tilt plates,
according to the suggested locations depicted in Fig. 7. For the
access to the spandrel walls, a hydra crane vehicle with basket
was used. It was not possible however, for technical problems of
installation and calibration of the verticality, to acquire all the
information provided by the 14 tilt plates. Based on the access
availability, installed tilt plates at up-stream side and down-
stream side are shown in Fig. 7 with a green tick, whereas tilt
plates that were not properly installed or provided weird measure-
ments are indicated with a red cross. On a total of 14 tilt plates, 11
were correctly installed, which seems very satisfactory from an
engineering standpoint.
Construction and Building Materials 280 (2021) 122490
Arch 2 Arch 3
MEMS tilt meters were used, and the tilt plate typology adopted
in the experimental study is shown in Fig. 7. Tilt sensors needed to
be put over the tilt plate along both axes (horizontal and vertical)
to measure tilting. The measured differential tilt was stored in a tilt
meter data logger. The steps followed to install each tilt plane are
reported in Fig. 8 for the sake of completeness.
3. Crack Growth Monitoring CGM
Vibrating wire displacement transducer (VWDT) readings were
acquired for the following two conditions: no load condition and
statically loaded condition. For the so-called ‘‘no load condition”,
the readings were collected in absence of any vehicular loading
and they are considered as Initial Readings (R1). In the phase of
the so called ‘‘statically loaded condition”, a static vehicular load
was applied at different locations of the deck and the changes in
the crack width were monitored. Readings collected in this phase
are considered as Final Readings (R2).
As already mentioned, installation of only three VWDTs was
possible, all on the soffit of Arch 1. VWDTs have separate serial
numbers and gauge factors from which we can differentiate
between them. The details of VWDTs’ serial numbers and locations
with gauge factor are shown in Table 1. Here it is worth noting that
VWDT No. 4988 (1) and 4708 (2) were installed along the longitu-
dinal direction, whereas VWDT No. 4987 (3) was installed along
the transverse direction. Fig. 9 shows the locations of installed
VWDTs with their serial numbers.
Under static load conditions, a heavy vehicle was placed over
Arch 1. The vehicle used for the application of the load was a water
tank truck. Its axle weights were measured using a weighing
bridge. Details about the weights and dimensions of the vehicle
used are shown in Fig. 10. The truck was disposed in three different
locations over Arch 1, as shown in Fig. 11. Loading location 1 is at
5
N. Grillanda, G. Milani, S. Ghosh et al.
Crack width at Point 3 (27.90 mm)
Fig. 4. Pre-existing crack width at points 1–5 for Arch 1.
the crown, with the rear axle centroid placed exactly in the middle
of the arch. Final readings of crack meters are summarized in
Table 2.
As it can be observed from Table 2, VWDTs installed along the
longitudinal direction (#1 and #2) show in the majority of the
cases negative displacements, associated as expected to an extra
compression of the arch along the longitudinal direction. Only for
readings of VWDT 4708 (longitudinal direction) #2 there is a small
positive displacement for Load Location #3, which is however
associated to an axial strain that is very low. Strain is obtained
dividing the measured displacements by VWDT length, equal to
120 mm. Considering the negligible values of the strains for
VWDT#2 4708 (placed along the longitudinal direction) for each
load location, it appears evident how the entire extra weight of
the truck transfers mainly to the external arch, assuming intu-
itively that the longitudinal crack splits the bridge partially into
two separate arches. Considering that the truck is always posi-
tioned on the axis of the road, the SHM results appear justified only
if one considers a diffusion of the vertical load along the external
spandrels due to the presence of the infill. Such an effect is in this
case not beneficial, because it could potentially result into a split-
6
Construction and Building Materials 280 (2021) 122490
Crack width at Point 1 (18.84 mm)
Crack width at Point 2 (16.50 mm)
Crack width at Point 4 (26.17 mm)
Crack width at Point 5 (26.20 mm)
ting of the bridge with consequent out-of-plane overturning of the
spandrels or the in-plane failure of the external portion of the arch.
The limit analysis model used later is able to take into account such
phenomenon, because truly 3-dimensional, a feature which obvi-
ously 2D approaches cannot put at disposal to the user.
As far as the external arch is concerned, Fig. 12 shows a compar-
ison between strains evaluated experimentally on VWDT #1 4988
(placed along the longitudinal direction on the external arch) and
those numerically computed with a 2D elastic FE model of the arch
assumed externally constrained with two hinges and with a realis-
tic elastic modulus of 2000 MPa.
As Fig. 12 shows, the agreement is very satisfactory. Further-
more, the level of strain appears relatively high, with a non-
negligible possibility of crushing of the masonry material inside
weak mortar joints.
VWDT installed along the transversal direction of the crack
shows a closure of the crack in correspondence of the point of
application, which globally does not mean that the external arch
is not subjected to an out-of-plane overturning, but only that the
formation of flexural hinges of the spandrels can be more complex
than a simple rocking of the arch around the abutments.
N. Grillanda, G. Milani, S. Ghosh et al.
Fig. 5. Installation steps followed for each VWDT,
4. Tilt monitoring
Tilt monitoring, as already pointed out, is essential to have an
insight into the possibility of a failure due to the out-of-plane over-
turning of the spandrels, a consequence of the splitting of the
bridge into two parts.
For the initial tilt readings, to access the spandrel walls, the
hydra crane was used, thus also the weight and location of the
hydra must be considered in the SHM campaign, since it has a sig-
nificant weight compared to the loading vehicle. The geometry and
weight (measured with a weighting bridge) of the hydra crane are
shown in Fig. 10. No additional vehicle loads - excluding the hydra
crane - were present on the bridge during the collection of the ini-
tial readings. Initial readings of installed tilt plates towards the
downstream and upstream sides were evaluated by repeating the
measurements three times for each tilt plate; their averages are
considered as initial readings.
7
Construction and Building Materials 280 (2021) 122490
For final readings, the tanker truck and the hydra crane were
used together to perform the experimental tilt monitoring. As far
as final readings are concerned, weight and location of both hydra
and loading vehicles were considered. The difference in final and
initial readings provided the differential tilt (Dh) occurred in span-
drel walls due to the application of a vehicular load represented by
the water tank truck in addition to the hydra crane. The mutual
locations of the tanker truck and the hydra crane considered are
summarized in Figs. 13–15.
Tilt readings for tilt plate #1 were taken for five different load-
ing locations of the tanker truck, as schematized in Fig. 13. Other
loading locations are shown in Fig. 14 and Fig. 15.
During the first phase, Tilt Plate No. 1 was monitored for 5 dif-
ferent load locations. From such experimental campaign, it was
decided to measure the tilt only for the loading location expected
to induce the maximum tilt. As a consequence, other tilt plates
were monitored in correspondence to the expected maximum
N. Grillanda, G. Milani, S. Ghosh et al. Construction and Building Materials 280 (2021) 122490

Fig. 6. Vibrating wire displacement transducers (VWDT) installed on Arch 1.

Fig. 7. Preliminary design of the locations of tilt plates on spandrels and detail of a tilt plate. Green ticks and red crosses indicate installed and not installed tilt plates
respectively. (For interpretation of the references to colour in this figure legend, the reader is referred to the web version of this article.)

critical loading condition. Readings of Tilt plate 7 and 11 did not
provide reasonable results, probably for an improper installation
of the instruments and it was decided to discard them. Table 3
shows the results obtained in terms of tilting (Dh) in tilting plate
#1 (all loading conditions) and the other plates with the
expected loading locations inducing the maximum tilting. As it
can be noticed, there are some meaningful tilts taking place in
8
spandrel walls due to the passage of heavy loads such as a hydra
crane and a water tanker. However, the maximum tilting values
(maximum differential tilt reading measured is 0.15 degrees for
Tilt Plate #1 in loading location A) seem far less for the activation
of an out-of-plane mechanism of the spandrel, as confirmed by
the adaptive NURBS limit analyses computations carried out in
the sequel.
N. Grillanda, G. Milani, S. Ghosh et al. Construction and Building Materials 280 (2021) 122490

Fig. 8. Installation steps followed for the tilt meter devices.

5. Numerical simulations with an adaptive NURBS limit analysis

Table 1 approach
Details of installed VWDTs.

Sr. No. VWDT Serial No. Location Gauge Factor In order to have a numerical insight into the state of safety of
1 4988 Downstream side of crack 4.188E02 the bridge under the application of static heavy loads simulating
2 4708 Upstream side of crack 4.200E02 the traffic passage, the authors decided to apply an adaptive upper
3 4987 Across the crack 4.244E02 bound limit analysis software developed originally by one of the

Fig. 9. Serial No. of Installed Crack Meters on Arch 1.

9
N. Grillanda, G. Milani, S. Ghosh et al. Construction and Building Materials 280 (2021) 122490

Water tank vehicle Hydra crane vehicle

Axle Weight (Tons) Axle Weight (Tons)

Front Axle 4.72 Front Axle 4.38
Rear Axle 11.88 Rear Axle 6.51

Fig. 10. Characteristics of the two loading vehicles (water tanker and hydra crane) used for the SHM.

Fig. 11. Application of the water tank vehicle load in three different positions of Arch 1.

authors (see [48] for details) and already benchmarked in a variety
of different problems, which include arches and curved masonry
structures in general [49–56]. At this aim, the geometrical repre-
sentation of the model is based on NURBS elements. NURBS sur-
faces can be modeled within the Rhinoceros software ‘‘as new”
or derived from point clouds obtained through laser scanner tech-
niques (as did in [57]). The mathematical formulation of NURBS
allows representing exactly a wide set of geometries (such as cir-
cles, conics, cylinders, surfaces of revolution, etc) and generating
surfaces from an arbitrary set of points through advanced fitting

10
N. Grillanda, G. Milani, S. Ghosh et al. Construction and Building Materials 280 (2021) 122490

Table 2
Readings of the three VWDTs installed on Arch 1 after the application of the water tank load (displacements d and axial strains e).

Readings of VWDT 4988 (longitudinal direction) #1

Loading Location R1 R2 G.F. d (mm) e (%)
1 5.62E+06 5.61E+06 4.19E02 0.22 0.1833
2 5.62E+06 5.61E+06 4.19E02 0.30 0.2500
3 5.62E+06 5.62E+06 4.19E02 0.04 0.0333
Readings of VWDT 4708 (longitudinal direction) #2
Loading Location R1 R2 G.F. d (mm) e (%)
1 5.21E+06 5.21E+06 4.20E02 0.03 0.0250
2 5.21E+06 5.21E+06 4.20E02 0.03 0.0250
3 5.21E+06 5.21E+06 4.20E02 0.03 0.0250
Readings of VWDT 4987 (transversal direction) #3
Loading Location R1 R2 G.F. d (mm) e (%)
1 5.67E+06 5.67E+06 4.24E02 0.04 0.0333
2 5.67E+06 5.61E+06 4.24E02 2.27 1.8917
3 5.67 E+06 5.66E+06 4.24E02 0.23 0.1917

8
strategies (for the detailed theoretical dissertation on NURBS, we >
> Aeq u ¼ 0 ðaÞ
>
>
refer to [58]). These properties make NURBS particularly suited >
> ~
>
>
< Du ¼ k_ T @@fr_ ðbÞ
for the representation of curved masonry structures.
Once available within Rhinoceros, NURBS are then imported k_  0 ðcÞ ð3Þ
>
>
into MATLAB interfacing the two software through IGES exchange >
> P ¼ 1
>
> n C¼1
o
files. The surface is successively extruded to account for the actual >
>
: min C ¼ Pin F 0 u
T

thickness of the structure and finally an initial mesh of the given
structure is generated by the user, typically using few elements.
The general procedure is sketched in Fig. 16. Each element of the
mesh is a NURBS surface with thickness and therefore an actual
curved geometry can be approximated very precisely with a very
coarse mesh. Each element is assumed rigid-infinitely resistant;
therefore, the only internal dissipation allowed is at the interfaces
between adjoining elements, which represent possible fracture
lines behaving -in agreement with theorems of limit analysis- as
perfectly plastic with associated flow rule. According to the rigid
body assumption, the kinematics of each element is fully deter-
mined by six (three translational and three rotational) generalized
n o
velocity variables uix ; uiy ; uiz ; Uix ; Uiy ; Uiz , representing centroid
velocities and rotation rates around the centroid.
In this way, an upper bound limit analysis problem with very
few optimization variables is obtained. The structure is assumed
subjected to dead loads F0 independent from the collapse multi-
plier C and live loads F dependent on C. Numerically, the power
dissipated on interfaces is evaluated by means of a classic colloca-
tion, i.e. subdividing each interface into a series of collocation
knots Pi, enforcing there also plastic compatibility. On each point
a local reference system (n, s, t) is defined, where n is the unit vec-
tor normal to the interface, s is the tangential unit vector in the
longitudinal direction and t is the tangential unit vector in the
transversal direction, as represented schematically in Fig. 18 where
a generic interface between two contiguous NURBS elements is
sketched with the collocation knots used to evaluate the internal
power dissipated.
A three-dimensional failure domain must be assigned to the
masonry material. The failure domain can be defined in the local
reference system when an isotropic behavior (i.e. a quasi no-
tension behavior) is considered. Alternatively, advanced homoge-
nization procedures can be followed to properly take into account
orthotropy [59] and, in the most complex cases, strongly irregular
masonry textures (see for instance [60]).
Referring the interested reader to the papers where the theory
of the approach is explained in detail, here we mention only that
the kinematic limit analysis problem obtained can be written in
compact notation as follows:
11
PC¼1
ðdÞ
where: Aeq is the matrix of coefficients in the equality constraints,
~
D u are the velocity jumps written in the local reference systems
(n, s, t), f is the three-dimensional failure domain, PC is the power
dissipated by live loads and Pin is the internal power dissipated.
The previous linear programming problem (Eq. (3)) includes
assembled geometrical constraints and boundary conditions (a),
plastic flow compatibility (b), non-negativity of the plastic multi-
plier rates (c), normalization condition obtained by imposing that
the power dissipated by the live loads is unitary when the load
multiplier C is unitary (d), and objective function, which provides
directly the collapse multiplier C of the live loads.
h i
The unknowns are represented by the vector x ¼ u; k_ , which
collects the generalized velocity components of the elements and
the plastic multiplier rates at each collocation point Pi where the
internal power is evaluated.
Thanks to the reduced number of NURBS elements used in the
discretization of the structure, still maintaining an accurate geo-
metric representation of a curved structure, the solution of the lin-
ear programming problem is obtained very quickly. However, the
problem turns out to be strongly mesh-dependent, meaning that
the risk of a dramatic overestimation of the load-carrying capacity
is high. Some mesh adjustment techniques are therefore needed;
the approach proposed by the authors is a meta-heuristic progres-
sive adaptation of the mesh carried out by means of a relatively
standard Genetic Algorithm (GA), developed on the basis of what
was proposed in [61], which proved to converge quite quickly to
the actual active failure mechanism. Individuals are represented
by the different meshes used and chromosomes by the positions
of the nodes that the users assume to progressively adjust in order
to converge to the optimal solution (see for instance Fig. 17). It is
not mandatory that all nodes are assumed with adjustable coordi-
nates; conversely, it is recommended to limit the number of chro-
mosomes selecting only few nodes that will be subjected to a
progressive adjustment, with the aim of limiting the computa-
tional burden.
In the present case study, only Arch 1 is modelled (because
assumed as the most vulnerable due to the presence of a deep
N. Grillanda, G. Milani, S. Ghosh et al. Construction and Building Materials 280 (2021) 122490

FE elastic model SHM measure

e = -0.00181 e = -0.00183

e = 0.000184 e = -0.00250

e = -0.00027 e = -0.00033
Fig. 12. Comparison between experimental strains evaluated in correspondence of VWDT #1 and FEM elastic simulations for loading locations 1, 2 and 3.

longitudinal crack), utilizing the coarse regular mesh depicted in
Fig. 19. It has been made the hypothesis that only 11 nodes can
adapt their position during the GA optimization. Nodes from 1 to
4 in Fig. 19 are allowed to change their position only longitudi-
nally; such nodes are coupled one by one on opposite sides of
12
the arch, i.e. an adjustment of the position of a node in the down-
stream face corresponds to the same adjustment of the node
located on the opposite side (upstream), having the same abscissa.
Nodes from 5 to 11 are assumed to move only transversally. In cor-
respondence of the monitored crack, represented in Fig. 19 by a
N. Grillanda, G. Milani, S. Ghosh et al. Construction and Building Materials 280 (2021) 122490

Fig. 13. Loading locations of water tanker and hydra crane for tilt plate # 1.

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N. Grillanda, G. Milani, S. Ghosh et al. Construction and Building Materials 280 (2021) 122490

Fig. 14. Loading locations of water tanker and hydra crane for tilt plates No. 9, 3, 10 and 4.

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N. Grillanda, G. Milani, S. Ghosh et al. Construction and Building Materials 280 (2021) 122490

Fig. 15. Loading locations of water tanker and hydra crane for tilt plates No. 8, 5, 12 and 14.

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N. Grillanda, G. Milani, S. Ghosh et al. Construction and Building Materials 280 (2021) 122490

Table 3
Tilt reading - summary.

Tilt Plate # Loading Dh

Location (Degrees)
X Y
Horizontal Vertical
1 1A 0.15 0.07
1B 0.09 0.01
1C 0.05 0.03
1D 0.04 0.04
1E 0.00 0.06
3 3A 0.05 0.11
4 4A 0.02 0.03
5 5A 0.04 0.03
8 8A 0.10 0.07
9 2B 0.07 0.07 Fig. 18. Subdivision of an interface with Pi collocation points and local reference
10 3B 0.01 0.12 system representation.
12 5B 0.03 0.11
14 7B 0.07 0.02

For the application of the load dependent on the load multiplier,

thick red line, the mesh is detached, i.e. an interface unable to
transmit tensile and shear stresses is assumed, with the possibility
to exhibit a contact in compression with a limited compressive
strength, as explained in detail hereafter.
As far as the backfill is concerned, it is not modeled explicitly by
finite elements but classically considering the vertical self-weight
(2000 kg/m3) and the corresponding horizontal stabilizing pres-
sure, with a corresponding coefficient of earth pressure at rest
equal to K 0 ¼ 1  sin u, where u is the backfill friction angle.
Two hypotheses are made for u, according to the lateral diffusion
of the load applied to the bridge by the water tanker, namely u
equal to 30° and 45°, which are values commonly associated to
gravel and rubble limestone materials.
the water tank vehicle has been represented by means of 6 pointed
loads, according to Fig. 10, each one placed at the center of the cor-
responding loading area. A distribution of vertical and radial stress
has been applied directly to the masonry arch according to a diffu-
sion model based on Boussinesq’s theory, as schematically
depicted in Fig. 20. u angle in Fig. 20 is the backfill friction angle.
Six different load cases are investigated: the first five load cases
consider the presence of only the water tanker in different posi-
tions. The load is increased up to the formation of a failure mech-
anism, provided that the mesh is gradually adapted to reproduce as
close as possible the actual failure mechanism associated with the
collapse of the arch in presence of the crack. The first three load
cases correspond to the water tanker placed along the middle lon-

Fig. 16. Generation steps for a NURBS mesh of an arch. -a: step 1, NURBS surface in Rhinoceros. -b: step 2: NURBS imported in MATLAB and extruded with the actual
thickness. -c: step 3: NURBS mesh.

Fig. 17. Mesh adjustment obtained with the GA optimization procedure proposed for an arch subjected to vertical loads. -a: random initial mesh; -b: optimized mesh.

16
N. Grillanda, G. Milani, S. Ghosh et al. Construction and Building Materials 280 (2021) 122490

Fig. 19. Initial mesh used to analyze Arch 1 with NURBS limit analysis.

3Pz '3
σ z' =
2π R 5
3Pr 2 z '
σr =
2π R 5

-a -b
Fig. 20. -a: 2D representation for each single pointed load of the diffusion of a vertical load on the surface of the arch. -b: Load dispersion along the transversal direction
according to a Boussinesq model (Poisson’s ratio assumed equal to 0.5 to maximize the stress along the radial direction).

gitudinal axis of the deck, in agreement with the SHM carried out.
As it can be observed from Figs. 21–23, where the failure mecha-
nism obtained with the correspondence safety factor -intended
as the ratio between the water tanker load and that triggering
the collapse- is reported, the arch is safe, with a much larger load
carrying capacity, even in presence of a relatively low compressive
strength for the arch (1.5 MPa) and a diffusion of the load equal to
45° (vertically and laterally).
When the water tanker is moved from the middle axis of the
deck to the lane located over the crack, the response obviously
becomes less safe with the activation of the failure mechanisms
shown in Fig. 24 and Fig. 25, which correspond to Load case 1
and 2 of the SHM campaign, but with the track positioned on
one lane. The corresponding safety factors decrease to C = 1.86
and C = 2.21 respectively, when the diffusion angle is again
assumed equal to 45°. According to these results, it can be stated
that there can be load cases not investigated experimentally that
tend to be critical for the stability of the structure.
This is confirmed by the last simulation carried out for Load
case 4, but in presence of the load of both the hydra crane (as-
sumed as independent from the load multiplier) and the water
tank (with load increased by the collapse multiplier up to failure),
positioned as illustrated in Fig. 26. In this last case, the safety factor
is still greater than one but drops to C = 1.37, i.e. near the collapse

17
N. Grillanda, G. Milani, S. Ghosh et al. Construction and Building Materials 280 (2021) 122490

Load case 1

Load dispersion angle: φ = 30° φ = 30°

Compression strength: fc = 2.5 MPa fc = 1.5 MPa
Safety factor: Γ = 9.49 Γ = 6.14

Load dispersion angle: φ = 45° φ = 45°

Compression strength: fc = 2.5 MPa fc = 1.5 MPa
Safety factor: Γ = 8.03 Γ = 4.39
Fig. 21. Load Case 1. Failure mechanisms found in the optimized mesh and corresponding safety factors in presence of load dispersion angles equal to 30° (top subfigures) and
45° (bottom subfigures) and a masonry compressive strength equal to 2.5 MPa (center) and 1.5 MPa (left).

of the arch with a partial out-of-plane overturning of the external
portion (see failure mechanism reported in Fig. 26).
6. Conclusions
The paper presented an innovative attempt to combine SHM
with an advanced limit analysis approach exhibiting a certain level
of sophistication and able to account for a pre-existing state of
cracks applied to an existing masonry arch bridge. The complex
case study analyzed was a three-arch masonry bridge built during
the mid-19th century by British engineers to connect the old Bom-
bay with the inland of the Indian subcontinent. At present, the
bridge is characterized by a heavy state of degradation, with a
potentially dangerous longitudinal crack on one of the arches that
requires an immediate evaluation of the safety under the passage
of heavy traffic loads and possible hints for a structural strengthen-
ing in order to prevent both the propagation of the crack and the
collapse of the structure. The adopted SHM consisted of both crack
growth monitoring under the application of a heavy load (a water
tanker) placed at different locations of the arch and tilting tests
carried out with a hydra crane and the same water tanker used
for the crack growth monitoring. The numerical modeling utilized
was an advanced kinematic limit analysis full 3D approach with
NURBS finite elements, able to take into account with a very rough
discretization pre-existing cracks and the actual curved geometry
of the structure. The advantage of such approach stands in the very
reduced computational time needed to provide with great accu-
racy the ultimate loads in different scenarios along with the corre-
sponding active failure mechanisms. The extremely high accuracy
of the numerical approach is secured by a progressive adaptation
of the initial coarse mesh adopted by means of a consolidated
meta-heuristic approach (in this case, a GA). From experimental
monitoring and numerical simulation results, it is concluded that
the bridge is still safe under the passage of traffic loads, but a
strengthening intervention, such as grouting of cracks and trans-
verse post-tensioning, is advisable. The numerical approach com-

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N. Grillanda, G. Milani, S. Ghosh et al. Construction and Building Materials 280 (2021) 122490

Load case 2

Load dispersion angle: φ = 30° φ = 30°

Compression strength: fc = 2.5 MPa fc = 1.5 MPa
Safety factor: Γ = 16.31 Γ = 4.84

Load dispersion angle: φ = 45° φ = 45°

Compression strength: fc = 2.5 MPa fc = 1.5 MPa
Safety factor: Γ = 16.30 Γ = 6.39
Fig. 22. Load Case 2. Failure mechanisms found in the optimized mesh and corresponding safety factors in presence of load dispersion angles equal to 30° (top subfigures) and
45° (bottom subfigures) and a masonry compressive strength equal to 2.5 MPa (center) and 1.5 MPa (left).

bined with SHM allowed to perform fast and computationally
cheap analyses by taking into account the main characteristics of
the actual construction, i.e. exact curved geometry and detected
cracks. Moreover, the most relevant advantage of combining
SHM with adaptive limit analysis is the possibility to validate limit
analysis results with the monitoring data for few load cases and
then provide different scenarios very quickly to have an insight
into the most dangerous load-combination to investigate. A future
development of the combined procedure proposed is to perform
limit analyses simulations in real-time, i.e. contemporarily with
the SHM, ‘‘guiding” in a certain way the experimentation/monitor-
ing to discover almost immediately the most dangerous loads loca-
tions that could be associated to a premature failure of the
structure.
CRediT authorship contribution statement
Nicola Grillanda: Investigation, Software, Data curation, Valida-
tion, Writing - review & editing. Gabriele Milani: Methodology,
Conceptualization, Validation, Writing - original draft, Supervision.

19
N. Grillanda, G. Milani, S. Ghosh et al. Construction and Building Materials 280 (2021) 122490

Load case 3

Load dispersion angle: φ = 30° φ = 30°

Compression strength: fc = 2.5 MPa fc = 1.5 MPa
Safety factor: Γ = 14.63 Γ = 8.89

Load dispersion angle: φ = 45° φ = 45°

Compression strength: fc = 2.5 MPa fc = 1.5 MPa
Safety factor: Γ = 20.10 Γ = 11.23
Fig. 23. Load Case 3. Failure mechanisms found in the optimized mesh and corresponding safety factors in presence of load dispersion angles equal to 30° (top subfigures) and
45° (bottom subfigures) and a masonry compressive strength equal to 2.5 MPa (center) and 1.5 MPa (left).

Siddhartha Ghosh: Methodology, Data curation, Writing - review
& editing, Resources, Supervision. Bhumik Halani: Methodology,
Investigation, Data curation, Conceptualization, Writing - original
draft. Mahesh Varma: Methodology, Investigation, Data curation,
Conceptualization, Writing - original draft.
Declaration of Competing Interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing finan-
cial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared
to influence the work reported in this paper.

20
N. Grillanda, G. Milani, S. Ghosh et al. Construction and Building Materials 280 (2021) 122490

Load case 4

Load dispersion angle: φ = 30° φ = 30°

Compression strength: fc = 2.5 MPa fc = 1.5 MPa
Safety factor: Γ = 10.00 Γ = 1.90

Load dispersion angle: φ = 45° φ = 45°

Compression strength: fc = 2.5 MPa fc = 1.5 MPa
Safety factor: Γ = 7.03 Γ = 1.86
Fig. 24. Load Case 4. Failure mechanisms found in the optimized mesh and corresponding safety factors in presence of load dispersion angles equal to 30° (top subfigures) and
45° (bottom subfigures) and a masonry compressive strength equal to 2.5 MPa (center) and 1.5 MPa (left).

21
N. Grillanda, G. Milani, S. Ghosh et al. Construction and Building Materials 280 (2021) 122490

Load case 5

Load dispersion angle: φ = 30° φ = 30°

Compression strength: fc = 2.5 MPa fc = 1.5 MPa
Safety factor: Γ = 17.78 Γ = 2.87

Load dispersion angle: φ = 45° φ = 45°

Compression strength: fc = 2.5 MPa fc = 1.5 MPa
Safety factor: Γ = 8.09 Γ = 2.21
Fig. 25. Load Case 5. Failure mechanisms found in the optimized mesh and corresponding safety factors in presence of load dispersion angles equal to 30° (top subfigures) and
45° (bottom subfigures) and a masonry compressive strength equal to 2.5 MPa (center) and 1.5 MPa (left).

22
N. Grillanda, G. Milani, S. Ghosh et al.
Load dispersion angle:
Compression strength:
Safety factor:
Fig. 26. Load case 6. Contemporary presence of hydra crane (assumed as load independent from the load multiplier) and water tank load (increased up to failure). Safety
factor in presence of a load dispersion angle equal to (top 45° and a masonry compressive strength equal to 1.5 MPa.
Acknowledgements
We express our sense of gratitude to Public Work Department,
Thane (India) for their co-ordination and on-site help throughout
monitoring of the bridge. We would like to extend our gratitude
to the team of Shree Datta Construction, Kalyan for their help dur-
ing monitoring.
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