Advanced considerations in LiDAR technology : application enhancement, inspection workflow implementation and data collection quality management

Bridge inspection is a critical topic in infrastructure management and is facing unprecedented challenges as the public is concerned more about bridge safety after a series of bridge failures. LiDAR based remote sensing is recommended as a way in supplementing the prevailing visual inspection to quantify critical bridge information. In this research, focus will be placed on the advanced considerations of LiDAR technology in bridge inspection, including the application evaluation, inspection workflow implementation, and data collection quality management. Particularly, efforts on improving the computational performance of the original damage detection algorithm have been carried out and the use of reflectivity data is introduced as a new feature to enhance the algorithm’s capability in defect recognition. The specific applications that using LiDAR technology to evaluate bridge deck joint and monitoring simulated slope erosion have been studied. This research further studied the inspection workflow implementation and the sources of errors in the LiDAR bridge inspection. Quality management has also been considered to improve the bridge inspection data quality besides the development of advanced inspection technology. In the end, comparative cost analysis is conducted to determine the savings for implementing LiDAR technology into bridge inspection workflow