Verbundplatten für Eisenbahnbrücken

Composite slab railway bridges

Among the most frequent tasks in the construction of railway bridges there is replacement or new building of structures up to some 20 m, comprising more than 80 % of the railway bridges. Normally the old objects to be replaced had been executed with an open track. The new bridges, however, should feature an enclosed track with a 55 cm (at least 45 cm) thick ballast bed, both for reason of continuity of the deck and of noise protection. For these reasons, and as mostly the gradient cannot be raised but to very small amounts, the height of construction must be limited to small values. This paper deals with composite slab bridges which can be taken as an alternative to filler beam bridges in the span range between 6,0 to 20,0 m. Depending on the span, this bridge type allows length ratios between 17,6 and 19,9.