A PROPOSED BRIDGE SEISMIC DESIGN PHILOSOPHY AND CRITERIA (ABSTRACT ONLY)

Since the Loma Prieta Earthquake and the report to the Governor on that earthquake, Competing Against Time, significant attention has been focused upon bridge post-earthquake performance. Seismic design criteria continue to evolve with each new major project in California, to such a degree that consistency can be difficult to identify. This paper offers an accumulation of the California perspective of those experiences and the lessons learned. This experience is not only field experience, but actual project development experience as well, including interaction with reviewing entities external to project teams. Specific reference to experiences developing minimum seismic performance (e.g., standard bridges) and lifeline performance (e.g., San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge) criteria are documented. The authors offer seismic design/retrofit philosophy and performance criteria that are essentially the product of their experiences since the Whittier Earthquake of 1987.