Bridges

Asset management is defined by ISO 55000 as 'the coordinated activity of an organisation to realise value from assets', where the definition and measure of value can vary significantly depending on the service required. To assist asset owners and managers in the management of their assets, there are many documents available that provide good foundational guidance, such as the International Infrastructure Management Manual. However, much of the information in these guides is often generic and not always easily applied to a specific asset class, such as bridges. To translate these generic principles to bridges, Austroads recently published "AP-G94-21 Engineering Guideline to Bridge Asset Management". This Guideline was developed to build on those foundational documents to provide specific asset management guidance for road bridges, and promotes an engineering approach (engineering principles, knowledge, experience and modelling tools) as being the only robust method for understanding the current and future, condition and needs of a bridge network. This paper provides some background behind the need for and the process of developing the guideline. The key principles of the guideline are presented. Some real-life examples will be provided to demonstrate how these principles can be practically implemented to demonstrate alignment with ISO 55000 and ISO 31000 risk management practice.