Modelagem do caminhar humano e avaliação de conforto humano de passarelas de pedestres.

Abstract

The structural engineer needs to adapt with the exigencies of low weight and less space occupied by the structures, which have been increasing more and more over the years. Related to footbridges, the structure slenderness and the low weight may lead to vibrations problems due to resonance with pedestrians walking. These problems may vary from a simple discomfort up to big problems, like the structural collapse. According to these premises, this dissertation aims to investigate two structural models, the first one in reinforced concrete and the other is related to a steel-concrete composite pedestrian footbridge, which will be analyzed by finite element method simulations using the software ANSYS. The numerical models make possible to evaluate the natural frequencies of structures and study the response due to forced vibrations induced by pedestrians walking. The dynamic responses of the investigated footbridges will be analyzed considering the maximum displacements and accelerations. The obtained results were compared with the main guidelines related to human comfort with regard to pedestrian walking on footbridges, in such a way that it showed possible problems due to vibrations, after analyzing the results obtained in the investigation. Thus, it was performed a study considering the variance of pedestrian position in order to analyze the dynamic response of the investigated footbridges in these cases.