Measurements and Prediction of Pedestrian Walking Loads on an Aluminium Catwalk

This paper reviews the results obtained from measurements taken at different points of an aluminium catwalk while different persons walked back and forth along a prescribed straight path at a certain frequency. Displacements as well as accelerations were measured at several locations on the catwalk. Some mechanical properties have been estimated from the test results like the bending stiffness of the beam, the fundamental frequency as well as the damping ratio of the fundamental mode. With this information at hand, a finite element model was set up and tuned. The experimental acceleration time histories were post-processed in order to identify the ones that were thought to be best suited for comparison with predicted values resulting from applying frequently used walking load models