In December 1986, the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation inaugurated its enhanced Bridge Management System. This system is the resource for district and state-wide management decisions involving bridges. Much of the data base for the Bridge Management System is provided by inspectors assigned to decentralised district bridge safety inspection units. It is vital that the system have accurate information with consistent interpretation state-wide. Each district has the responsibility for quality control within its inspection units. The Bridge Management System Division's Bureau of Bridge and Roadway Technology, located in the Central Office, monitors the overall quality of bridge safety inspection quality assurance activities. In 1985, Wilbur Smith Associates' Byrd, Tallamy, MacDonald and Lewis Division was selected to develop a quality assurance manual and implement the procedure for a 3-yr period beginning in 1986. The manual defines the quality assurance procedure and details the steps necessary to make it operational. This entails a review of the inspection activities in each district and statistical analysis of the findings. Various aspects of the findings are compared state-wide. An annual report is also provided each year as part of the quality assurance implementation. This document contains a summary of the district reports and a comparison of the findings state-wide. Although bridge safety inspection quality control and quality assurance are important, few if any state or local transportation agencies have developed standard procedures. The activities are often performed on a hit-or-miss basis, and the results may be difficult to interpret. This paper, in which the bridge safety inspection quality assurance activities developed and implemented for PennDOT are described, should be of interest to other practitioners involved in bridge management and inspection.
Samenvatting