Long-Term Bridge Performance Committee Letter Report: February 23, 2016

On February 23, 2016, TRB’s Long-Term Bridge Performance (LTBP) Committee sent its sixth letter report to Gregory Nadeau, administrator of the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA). The committee provides advice and assistance on the conduct of the LTBP program, which is designed to collect research-quality data on a large representative sample of in-service U.S. highway bridges and to analyze these data to improve understanding of the mechanisms and timing of bridge deterioration due to the effects of age, materials, traffic, and weather.

The report includes recommendations related to the development of data-driven decision-making tools as key elements of LTBP’s outreach efforts to the states; efforts to achieve short- and long-term goals; the development of a bridge deterioration prediction procedure; and the feasibility of incorporating results of NCHRP Report 668: “Framework for a National Database System for Maintenance Actions on Highway Bridges” into the LTBP Bridge Portal.