Steel Construction 01/15

Cover Story: The Acropolis Museum in Athens is a fine example of a seismically isolated structure. Unlike other structural protection systems against earthquake, a seismic isolation offers the possibility that the structure stays intact during an event of earthquake. Moreover even the objects within and on the seismically isolated structure can be protected from damaging.

These special properties of seismic isolation are especially attractive for the application to important infrastructures such as bridges, hospitals or fire departments as well as museums because the historical priceless objects can be protected with a high safety. The earthquake protection system of the Acropolis Museum is realized by 94 friction pendulum bearings. In addition to protection function the bearings provide a recentering of the structure after occurrence of a seismic event. (© Maurer AG, Munich)

Table of Content Steel Construction 01/2015:

• Non-linear seismic response of vehicle-bridge system
• Comparison of traffi c vibrations in steel and concrete bridges
• Safety assessment of bridge with fatigue crack
• Sandwich plate decks for new and existing bridges
• Steel bridges – service life simulation with fracture mechanics
• Tensile load-carrying behaviour of elastomeric bearings
• Tests and a unifi ed design method for beam-columns
• Formula for “true” shear buckling stresses in cold-formed channels
• Butyl rubber tapes as corrosion protection for bridge cables
• Complex geometry – Heydar Aliyev Centre