Concept for a digital twin of railway bridges on the example of the new Filstal bridges

The preservation of infrastructure is becoming increasingly important. The current reactive maintenance management only initiates maintenance measures after damage has occurred. Short‐term measures can lead to unforeseen restrictions in infrastructure availability and thus cause high social and economic damage.

High‐quality measurement technology, automated data analysis, structured data management and collaborative work are just a few technological developments that form the cornerstones for a future predictive maintenance strategy. The digital twin, a digital representation of the real object, combines these developments and is a promising method for a sustainable preservation of infrastructure.

Using the example of the Filstal bridges, a concept for a digital bridge twin is introduced. The digital twin combines measurement data, bridge information, inspection results as well as structural safety verifications and aggregates them to continuously display the current bridge condition and thus supports the maintenance of bridges. For intuitive use, all information is located and presented in a way that is consumable by the user.