Development of a Heavy Containment Level Bridge Rail for Istanbul

Abstract The international highways within the city limits of Istanbul are used to transit more than 15 million trucks and other heavy good vehicles per year. According to the statistics, the number of single truck run of the road accidents is in the rise. Recent accidents on bridges showed that currently used bridge rails specified by Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality (IMM) lack the required design criteria to safely contain and redirect heavy vehicles. The objective of this study is therefore design, analyze and test a new high containment level (HCL) bridge rail to be used on bridges on high risk locations, within the city limits of Istanbul. After the development and simulation phases, the bridge rail is subjected to full-scale crash testing in accordance with European Standard EN1317 to conclusively prove its adequacy. This study is of importance since the barrier is the first nationally developed high containment level bridge rail in Turkey. The bridge rail, YIM04 is currently in use on several bridge decks in Istanbul.