Tunnels are inherently designed for transportation.. Societal and economic development has led to the continuous construction of large-span bridges and underground tunnels over rivers, lakes, and seas. These projects are large in scale and structurally complex and have harsh service environment. Compared with underground tunnels, a bridge structure is more lightweight and flexible. However, it easily suffers from frequent traffic loads, fluctuating wind loads, rainstorm attacks, and temperature effects. Structural performance can easily degrade under the above loads or actions, posing a risk to the safe operation of the structure and even causing collapsed accidents.
In addition to these, Ventilation effectiveness due to high concentration of Carbon Monoxide, traffic analysis, intelligent Surveillances Systems.
The impetus for Structural Health Monitoring (SHM) of national assets like Tunnels is not only dictated by the considerations for transportation, safety, commercialize and economy of a region, but also by the implications to the nation's defense and preparedness; thus, necessitating REAL TIME STRUCTURAL HEALTH MONITORING (SHM) with Safety and Security to become an important constituent of any Tunnel management system.