Load testing of bridges is a practice that is as old as their construction. In the past, load testing gave the traveling public a feeling that a newly opened bridge is safe. Nowadays, the bridge stock in many countries is aging, and load testing is used for the assessment of existing bridges. This paper aims at giving an overview of the current state-of-the-art with regard to load testing of concrete bridges. The work is based on an extensive literature review, dealing with diagnostic and proof load testing, and looking at the current areas of research. Additional available information about load testing of steel, timber, and masonry bridges, buildings, and collapse testing is briefly cited. For the implementation of load testing to the aging bridge stock on a large scale, efficiency in procedures is required. The areas requiring future research are identified, based on the available body of knowledge.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.