The role of traffic in sustainability assessment of road bridges

Sustainability assessment always combines an investigation in the three dimensions of sustainability: the ecological, economic and socio-cultural dimension. Considering the ecological evaluation of highway overpasses, the impact due to traffic obstruction can produce a similar or higher amount of CO2 emissions compared to the construction related impacts. The results are subjected to high fluctuations depending on the input parameter. In this paper a special focus will be on effects that are associated with pollutants produced by traffic due to construction and maintenance processes.