The Medicine River Bridge is located in central Alberta on Highway 11, midway between Red Deer and Rocky Mountain House. The bridge is a three span cast-in-place concrete girder bridge constructed in 1954. It has a clear roadway of 8.5 metres. With traffic volumes in the order of 5000 AADT the bridge is an important link for local commuters to Red Deer and for oilfield traffic to west-central Alberta. Two deficiencies were identified regarding the functionality of the bridge. An assessment of the bridge and development of rehabilitation alternatives showed that bridge rehabilitation was more economical than bridge widening or bridge replacement. A load evaluation of the bridge was carried out in accordance with the Canadian Highway Bridge Design Code (CHBDC). This load evaluation showed that the girders were deficient in negative moment capacity but not in shear capacity. This paper describes the deficiencies identified in the Medicine River Bridge, the assessments carried out to select an appropriate rehabilitation strategy and the design and construction of the selected bridge rehabilitation strategy.
Abstract