The dynamic and earthquake response of a bridge pier model at the Volvi European test site

This paper presents result's of the measured and predicted response of a bridge pier model-structure which is constructed at the Volvi-Greece European Test Site for Earthquake Engineering. Despite the disadvantage of being unable to produce significant in-situ levels of ground motion, when desired, as can be generated by an earthquake simulator, this is in part compensated at the Test Site by the realistic foundations conditions, which are present for model structures that are built there and are supported, on the soft soil deposits in-situ. The current extension of the in-situ facility includes the possibility of subjecting the model structures to low to medium intensity man-made dynamic excitations. At this point in time the model. structures that are built at the test site include: a) A 6-story Reinforced Concrete building with masonry infills; b) A single bridge pier specimen built for the purposes of the currently running Euro-Risk program, which is supported by the European Union. The variation of the fundamental dynamic characteristics of the 6-story 1/3 3-D frame model structure was measured over a period of ten years. Masonry infills were added to this model structure at a certain period of its life span. So far, only one earthquake of moderateintensity has subjected the 6-story model structure to seismic loads and excited the permanent instrumentation system. The current sequence of experiments includes man-made dynamic excitations. for both the 6-story structure and the single bridge pier model. The main objective of the recent tests, which are partially. presented in this paper and involve the bridge-pier model, is to include influences on the dynamic structural response arising from the flexible foundation support conditions.