Aging, environmental conditions, damage due to vehicular impact, and increased gross vehicle weights result in structural deterioration that affects the load carrying capacity of bridges. These changes impact safety and require periodic re-evaluation of bridge capacity, defined as load rating. The load rating of a bridge is a component of the inspection process. It is used to determine both the safe load carrying capacity of a bridge and whether specific overweight vehicles can use the bridge. It is also used to determine if the bridge needs to be weight restricted, and, if so, what level of restriction (posting) is required. This course explores all of these facets, explains the various methods used, describes the required input data necessary, and develops the mathematical concepts. The following course, T715, continues the applications of the methods and the equations.

After completing this course, the student will be able to:

• Define the purpose of load rating and various terms used in load rating
• Distinguish between the different load rating methods
• Differentiate among different types of loading used in load rating analyses
• Formulate the rating factor equation