الفهرس 
INTRODUCTIONOnly 14 pages are availabe for public view
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Abstract
In recent years, it has become apparent that many structures in seismic zones are inadequate to resist seismic loading. During recent earthquakes, several structures have collapsed in different places all over the world. Furthermore, some of these failures occurred at relatively low levels of ground motion. Bridge structures are by far the most critical links because of their vulnerability to damage. Seismic retrofitting of existing highway bridges is one method of mitigating the risk that currently exists.
However, funding for bridge seismic upgrading is limited, thus the management and prioritization of bridge retrofit is vital.
The task of this thesis is to develop an improved simplified analytical procedure for assessing the seismic performance of existing reinforced concrete highway bridges.
This evaluation methodology aims to express quantitatively what is known only qualitatively such that it can deal in a simplified way and quantify its seismic risk.
This research presents a simple evaluation method capable to assess the vulnerability rating and risk level of the reinforced concrete highway bridges without complex calculations. The proposed methodologies cover the most important dynamic characteristics of the bridge structure. It is developed depending on the available data and researches on the seismic performance of these type of structures. Also the performance of bridges during past earthquakes and the potential of bridge seismic deficiencies are considered in the development of this procedure. The proposed methodology is presented and programmed in a simple form, so it can be systematically applied by engineers having minimum dynamic experience.
To calibrate the proposed evaluation to be more confidenent with its results of evaluation, and make it applicable for use, sixteen different bridges located in different sites are considered.
Finally, one typical Egyptian RC highway bridge is chosen to be evaluated to indicate the seismic vulnerability and risk of this category of bridges in Egypt.