Risk management and monitoring of Japanese railway bridges

Risk management of Japanese railway bridges consists of hardware improvement and software regulation based on monitoring. An overview of the risk management and monitoring of railway bridges in Japan is provided. The characteristics of the railway system and natural disasters in Japan are summarised based on statistics. A steady decrease in disaster-related loss as a result of consistent investment is observed. Conventional countermeasures mostly depend on hardware improvement, where occurrence of events is controlled. Statistical analysis indicates that the severity of railway accidents also depends on post-derailment phenomena and consequences. To reduce loss further, monitoring systems to control these consequences are attracting more interest. Wind, vehicle collision and scour are taken as examples to show that experiences from disasters can lead to management practice improvement. Finally, the current development of a structural monitoring system is introduced to demonstrate the advantage of monitori...