Dynamic Response of a Guardrail System Based on Prestressed Cables

Abstract

Road safety is a major global concern nowadays. Within the road infrastructure, bridge sectors are the most dangerous in terms of the incidence and severity of accidents. Engineering practice is to reduce their gravity by installing safety barriers with a very high level of protection, type H4b. There are however situations in which these protection systems actually and up reducing the level of safety for road users by limiting visibility.

This paper studies the possibility of adopting an innovative safety barrier solution based on modern, more efficient materials such as prestressed high-strength steel reinforcement. Scaled model of 1:20 tests and numerical simulations are presented for a guardrail system made up of high strength cables and plastic hinge supports.