Articles

Delaware Memorial Bridge UHPC Overlay Deck Rehabilitation—Contrctor's Perspective

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Abstract

This is an accepted article with a DOI pre-assigned that is not yet published.

The Delaware River Bay Authority (DRBA) awarded the Delaware Memorial Bridge (DMB) UHPC Deck Rehabilitation of Structure 1 project to UHPC Solutions North America. DRBA chose UHPC as a rehabilitation solution due to its superior strength, chloride/salt resistance, and 75-year life span. This $71 million project will use approximately 4,700 yd3 of UHPC and will be the largest UHPC overlay installation to date. The DMB Structure 1 consists of four lanes of traffic, a total length of 10,765 ft, and a 550,000 ft2 deck area. The UHPC overlay preservation of the entire northbound bridge deck is scheduled to occur in three separate phases during the Fall of 2022, Spring of 2023 and Fall of 2023. Due to its size and scope, new construction techniques were deployed to accelerate installation methods for hydrodemolition and the UHPC overlay to meet the project's specific schedule. This presentation provides a status update on Phases 1 (Fall 2022) and 2 (Spring 2023) of the three scheduled construction phases of this iconic industry rehabilitation project. Project overview, maintenance of traffic, construction methods, equipment selections, challenges and solutions from a contractor's perspective are discussed. The UHPC technology, hydrodemolition, surface preparation, paving details, lessons learned, and construction method modifications from both phases will be reviewed. Bridge agencies who seek a cost-effective and long-lasting preservation strategy for bridge decks will learn how UHPC overlays can be installed in a cost effective way so that service life of their aging infrastructure can be extended while minimizing traffic interruption during construction.

Keywords: bridges, project examples. applications

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