Digital twins for civil infrastructure: A case study on the Clifton suspension bridge (Bristol, UK)

Validated digital Twins support the optimisation of the performance, life-extension, maintenance, design and full-life costs of infrastructural assets; however, in the Civil Engineering sector their actual application and technology is still largely at the development stage. This study advanced a framework for using Digital Twins for civil infrastructure, which could be applied to various assets. This paper applied the framework to the historic Clifton Suspension Bridge in Bristol (UK). This aim was achieved through the following objectives: (i) proposing a working framework applicable to various assets; (ii) applying the framework and developing the physical-virtual architecture for the case study of the Clifton Suspension Bridge (Bristol); (iii) reflecting and drawing lessons from the application. The novelty of this work consists in illustrating the step-by-step framework of twinning, which is not limited to a methodological perspective nor to a particular asset of civil infrastructure. In addition to the theoretical contribution, this work’s importance also includes the case study itself, which ultimately offers a needed demonstration of the concept of digital twinning.