International Journal of Applied Earth Observations and Geoinformation 103 (2021) 102476

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

International Journal of Applied Earth

Observations and Geoinformation
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/jag

A structure knowledge-synthetic aperture radar interferometry integration

method for high-precision deformation monitoring and risk identification
of sea-crossing bridges
Xiaoqiong Qin a, b, c, d, Qingquan Li a, Xiaoli Ding b, Linfu Xie a, b, c, Chisheng Wang a, b, *,
Mingsheng Liao c, Lu Zhang c, Bochen Zhang a, b, Siting Xiong a
a
Ministry of Natural Resources (MNR) Key Laboratory for Geo-Environmental Monitoring of Great Bay Area & Guangdong Key Laboratory of Urban Informatics &
Shenzhen Key Laboratory of Spatial Mart Sensing and Services, College of Architecture & Urban Planning, Shenzhen University, Shenzhen 518060, China
b
Department of Land Surveying and Geo-Informatics, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Kowloon 999077, Hong Kong, China
c
State Key Laboratory of Information Engineering in Surveying, Mapping and Remote Sensing, Wuhan University, Wuhan 430079, China
d
Land Satellite Remote Sensing Application Center, Ministry of Natural Resources of the People’s Republic of China, Beijing 100048, China

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Keywords: Deformation monitoring and risk identification of sea-crossing bridges are essential to mitigate hazards and
Time-series InSAR prevent loss of human life and property. Satellite-based Synthetic Aperture Radar Interferometry (InSAR)
Deformation monitoring technology can detect millimeter-scale deformation, showing unique advantages in the safety monitoring of sea-
Structural knowledge
crossing bridges. However, the existing InSAR methods only extract point-like targets (PTs) based on the
Structural risk identification
Sea-crossing bridge
coherent index, but ignores the analysis of multiple SAR incoherent information and the foreground-background
scattering characteristics differences of bridges, leading to low-density and low-accuracy of PTs on sea-crossing
bridges. Moreover, most InSAR-based studies identified structural risks according to deformation measurements
without fully considering the various safe deformation ranges of different structural components, resulting in
high false-alarm/miss-detection rates in structural risk identification of sea-crossing bridges. To address these
issues, a structure knowledge-InSAR integration approach is developed for high-precision deformation moni­
toring and reliable risk identification of sea-crossing bridges. Firstly, the SAR incoherent information and
foreground-background scattering characteristics of the bridge structure are analyzed and applied to improve the
density of extractable PTs and remove the incorrect noise signals. Then, the bridge structural mechanics model is
combined with the InSAR time-series displacements to analyze the mechanical property degradation of different
bridge components, improving the reliability of InSAR-based structural risk identification. This approach is
applied to the Stonecutters Bridge and Tsing Ma Bridge using the TerraSAR-X and COSMO-SkyMed images from
2011 to 2012 and the Sentinel-1A images from 2015 to 2017. The results indicate that the densities of PTs
extracted on the two bridges increased by about 40% using the new approach, and incorrect noise signals are
removed. Moreover, the mechanical properties of different bridge components can be evaluated through the
analysis of their structural stress and time-series displacements, helping to decrease the false-alarm/miss-
detection rates of InSAR-based structural risk identification. The bridge deformation is correlated with the
temperature variation when the temperature difference is large (≥10 ◦ C), but no longer dominated by thermal
dilation when the temperature difference is less than 10 ◦ C due to the influence of environmental effects.

1. Introduction
Structural risks of sea-crossing bridges must be regularly surveyed to
ensure the safety of human life and property in coastal cities. However,
sea-crossing bridges are located in complex coastal environments and
vulnerable to various external effects, which usually suffer from varying
degrees of structural damage and deformation (Cusson et al., 2011; Han
et al., 2016). If such structural deformation cannot be detected and
managed in time, it may result in structural failure and even cause
extensive casualties (Orellana et al., 2020; Ding et al., 2020). This

* Corresponding author.
E-mail address: wangchisheng@szu.edu.cn (C. Wang).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jag.2021.102476
Received 30 April 2021; Received in revised form 28 July 2021; Accepted 2 August 2021
Available online 10 August 2021
1569-8432/© 2021 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).
X. Qin et al.
Fig. 1. Structure of the Stonecutters Bridge.
highlighted the importance of developing rapid, high-precision, and
low-cost techniques for deformation monitoring and risk identification
of sea-crossing bridges, to prevent possible bridge structural failures.
Two types of methods are currently used for bridge deformation
monitoring: regular manual detection (visual inspection, leveling, etc.)
and automatic sensor monitoring (accelerometers, strain gauges, etc.).
Although these point-based methods are accurate, the complexity of
bridge structures and survey environments results in low operating ef­
ficiencies, infrequent observations, and low spatial-sampling densities in
bridge deformation monitoring (Sun et al., 2019). These methods are
therefore not practical for rapid monitoring of the continuous and
overall deformations of sea-crossing bridges.
The Synthetic Aperture Radar Interferometry (InSAR) technique is a
space-borne geodesy technique that can quickly obtain large-area sur­
face deformation at all-time and all-weather conditions (Ferretti et al.,
2001; Liao and Wang, 2014; Castellazzi et al., 2017). On the technical
side, the de-correlation and atmospheric effects in the traditional InSAR
technique have been overcome by the development of many time-series
InSAR techniques (Crosetto et al., 2016; Osmanoglu et al., 2016; Zhu
et al., 2017). In terms of data acquisition, the TerraSAR-X and COSMO-
SkyMed satellites established a high-resolution era for space-borne SAR
imagery, and the Sentinel-1 satellites can provide weekly-cycled free
SAR images for researchers (Chang et al., 2014; Declercq et al., 2017;
Sadeghi et al., 2021). Therefore, the more advanced InSAR methods and
stronger SAR imaging capabilities enable the InSAR technique to play an
increasingly powerful role in high precision, rapid, and long-term
deformation monitoring of ground features such as sea-crossing
bridges (Liu et al., 2014; Pratesi et al., 2015; Qin et al., 2017; Lin
et al., 2017).
Currently, time-series InSAR technique has been applied in a few
studies to generate impressive bridge deformation monitoring results.
One of the first studies, by Sousa et al. (2013), investigated the historical
displacements of a beam bridge over a 5.5-year period combining the
persistent scatterer interferometry (PSI) and small baseline subset
(SBAS) methods with ERS images, which demonstrated the bridge
deformation monitoring capability of time-series InSAR techniques.
Improvements in data quality and techniques have then resulted in
more effective and detailed studies, especially those related to thermal
dilation modeling. Thus, Fornaro et al. (2013), Crosetto et al. (2015),
Huang et al. (2017), Qin et al. (2018), and Zhu et al. (2020) all
demonstrated that time-series InSAR methods could be used to monitor
the structural thermal responses of large steel bridges, and the thermal
dilation patterns are found to be related to the specific bridge structures
Furthermore, Lazecky et al. (2017) refined the thermal dilation com­
ponents of two highway bridges by considering the empirical tempera­
ture difference between the air and road.
Improvements in deformation estimation were made by Zhao et al.
(2017) and Zhang et al. (2018), who used the temporal coherent point
(TCP) InSAR method to achieve more accurate registration and eleva­
tion determination in bridge monitoring. In addition, Karimzadeh et al.
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International Journal of Applied Earth Observation and Geoinformation 103 (2021) 102476
(2018) used multi-sensor InSAR analysis to determine the three-
dimensional deformation of a long-span steel bridge.
Deformation interpretation has also been examined in several
studies. Qin et al. (2019) investigate the deformation characteristics of
complexly structured arch bridges and cable-stayed bridges. Ma et al.
(2019), Selvakumaran et al. (2020), and Schlogl et al. (2021) performed
detailed time-series deformation analysis of beam bridges and cable-
stayed bridges, and discussed the advantages and limitations of the
InSAR technique for bridge monitoring. Selvakumaran et al. (2018),
Milillo et al. (2019), and Cusson et al. (2020) reviewed the deformation
signals before the catastrophic structural failure of bridges to explore
whether such signals could be used as part of an early-warning system
for impending bridge failure.
Despite the wide applications of the previous InSAR-based studies to
investigate bridge deformation, there are still challenges that limit the
high-precision InSAR deformation monitoring and risk identification of
the complexly structured sea-crossing bridges. Firstly, most of the pre­
vious studies focused on monitoring highly coherent bridges, such as
beam bridges and arch bridges, which usually show higher coherence in
SAR image and are easier to select dense and accurate PTs on the bridge
than partially coherent bridges, such as flexible cable-supported bridges.
This study, therefore, examines the Stonecutters Bridge and Tsing Ma
Bridge, which are flexible cable-stayed and suspension bridges with low
coherence that exhibit more severe vibrations than highly coherent
bridges. Secondly, previous studies usually identified structural risks of
bridges only based on InSAR deformation measurements, without
considering the structural knowledge, such as the various structural
stress and deformation modes of different bridge components, resulting
in high false-alarm/miss-detection rates of InSAR-based structural risk
identification.
This study addresses the above problems by integrating structural
knowledge with InSAR measurements. First, the SAR incoherent infor­
mation and foreground-background scattering characteristics of the
bridge structure are analyzed and applied to improve the density of
extractable PTs and to remove the incorrect noise signals. Next, the
bridge structural mechanics model is combined with the InSAR time-
series displacements to analyze the mechanical property degradation
of different bridge components, improving the reliability of InSAR-based
structural risk identification.
By considering the SAR incoherent information and foreground-
background scattering characteristics of sea-crossing bridges, our
method greatly improves the density and accuracy of structural PTs.
This is demonstrated by the fact that the PTs densities obtained by our
method on the two sea-crossing bridges are about 40% higher than those
obtained by the StaMPS PSI method, and the incorrect noise signals are
removed. Moreover, the mechanical properties of different bridge
components are evaluated through the integration analysis of their
structural force and InSAR time-series displacements, and thus decrease
the false-alarm/miss-detection rates of InSAR-based structural risk
identification.
X. Qin et al. International Journal of Applied Earth Observation and Geoinformation 103 (2021) 102476

(meters). The perpendicular baseline (B⊥ ) is the component of the

spatial baseline that perpendicular to the line-of-sight (LOS) (meters).

3. Methodology

In this study, a series of data preprocessing, including the baseline

estimation, interferometry-pair selection, image cropping, registration
and resample, are firstly implemented by Doris to generate high-quality
interferograms. Then, the PTs selection, deformation estimation, and
error phase separation are carried out by the StaMPS software. Based on
that normal processing program, a structure knowledge-InSAR integra­
tion method (see Fig. 4), containing two key novel approaches: (1)
scattering characteristics and semantic information aided PTs accurate
extraction and (2) structural mechanics-InSAR integrated bridge risk-
points identification and refinement, is proposed to overcome the
problems that hindered the high-precision InSAR deformation moni­
toring and risk identification of sea-crossing bridges.

3.1. Scattering characteristics and semantic information aided PTs

accurate extraction
Fig. 2. Coverages of SAR datasets and locations of the two bridges.
Accurate extraction of PTs is a prerequisite for the reliable defor­
mation monitoring. However, conventional StaMPS PSI method (Hooper
2. Objects and datasets
et al., 2012) extracts PTs only based on a single index of SAR amplitude
deviation without considering the multiple incoherent information of
The Stonecutters Bridge and Tsing Ma Bridge in Hong Kong are
bridges. Moreover, the bridge back-scattering characteristics are not
chosen as our study objects. The Stonecutters Bridge, built from 2004 to
fully analyzed so that the bridge signals are aliased with the background
2012, is the third-longest cable-stayed bridge in the world. It has a main
signals, which cause the low-density and low-accuracy of structural PTs.
span of 1080 m and two side spans of 290 m, and is supported by two
To address these problems, SAR coherent and incoherent information is
298 m-tall cable towers and 8 piers as shown in Fig. 1 (Sham et al.,
firstly combined to enable the co-selection of permanent-coherent and
2016). The Tsing Ma Bridge, built from 1992 to 1997, is the longest rail-
partial-coherent bridge scatterers. These scatterers are then subject to a
road suspension bridge in the world. It has a main span of approximately
refined de-noising via spatial–temporal feature-matching with the
1377 m and side-spans of 455 m (Ma-Wan) and 300 m (Qing-Yi), and is
bridge foreground-background scattering model, to distinguish the vir­
supported by two 206 m-tall pylons as shown in Fig. 3 (Yong et al.,
tual signals from useful signals of the bridge (see Fig. 5).
2013). The geolocations of the two bridges are shown in Fig. 2.
21 ascending TerraSAR-X and 18 descending COSMO-SkyMed im­
3.1.1. Coherent/incoherent information integrated scatterers densification
ages, both acquired from 2011 to 2012, and 52 ascending C-band
selection
Sentinel-1A images (from 2015 to 2017) are processed and analyzed in
The bridge foreground-background scattering model is described in
this study. The coverage of the three datasets is shown in Fig. 2, and their
Fig. 6. Three types of bridge foreground signals are found in SAR images
basic information are illustrated in Tables 1–3. The temporal baseline
(see Fig. 6a): the bridge superstructure single scattering signals (blue
(BT ) indicates the time interval between two SAR images (days), and the
arrows) and bridge-side-water double scattering signals (green arrows
spatial baseline (B) represents the distance between the two antennas
similar to dihedral reflectors) with high intensity, and the bridge-

Fig. 3. Structure of the Tsing Ma Bridge.

Table 1
Basic information of the three SAR satellite datasets.
Satellite Incidence angle(◦ ) Resolution(m) Imaging mode Polarization Angle between flight direction and bridge orientation

Stonecutters Bridge Tsing Ma Brige

TerraSAR-X 34.31 3*3 Stripmap VV ~25◦ ~80◦

COSMO-SkyMed 41.06 3*3 Stripmap VV ~45◦ –
Sentinel-1A 32.97 5*20 Interferometric Wide Swath VH ~25◦ ~80◦

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X. Qin et al. International Journal of Applied Earth Observation and Geoinformation 103 (2021) 102476

Table 2
The temporal and perpendicular baselines of TerraSAR-X and COSMO-SkyMed datasets.
TerraSAR-X Date BT (day) B⊥ (m) COSMO-SkyMed Date BT (day) B⊥ (m)

1 20,110,803 − 143 − 17.2 1 20,110,731 − 136 − 78.5

2 20,110,825 − 121 − 135.8 2 20,110,809 − 128 718.4
3 20,110,905 − 110 − 130.6 3 20,110,901 − 104 587.2
4 20,111,008 − 77 − 386.4 4 20,110,910 − 96 1023.5
5 20,111,019 − 66 − 122.7 5 20,110,926 − 80 227.1
6 20,111,030 − 55 − 19.3 6 20,111,003 − 72 399.3
7 20,111,202 –22 − 46.2 7 20,111,019 − 56 1079.3
8 20,111,213 − 11 − 153.1 8 20,111,104 − 40 1088.7
9 20,111,224 0 0 9 20,111,120 − 24 121.4
10 20,120,104 11 92.8 10 20,111,129 − 16 1108.6
11 20,120,206 44 80.3 11 20,111,215 0 0
12 20,120,217 55 74.9 12 20,120,123 40 590.2
13 20,120,321 88 − 139.6 13 20,120,311 88 688.3
14 20,120,401 99 − 217.5 14 20,120,327 104 696.1
15 20,120,412 110 − 38.7 15 20,120,412 120 39.5
16 20,120,423 121 − 137.6 16 20,120,428 136 710.4
17 20,120,504 132 − 28.5 17 20,120,514 152 937.7
18 20,120,515 143 − 90.1 18 20,120,530 168 409.8
19 20,120,526 154 20.4
20 20,120,606 165 − 241.8
21 20,120,617 176 − 128.8

Table 3
The temporal and perpendicular baselines of Sentinel-1A dataset.
Sentinel-1A Date BT (day) B⊥ (m) Sentinel-1A Date BT (day) B⊥ (m)

1 20,151,001 − 432 57.41 27 20,161,218 12 10.57

2 20,151,013 − 420 61.99 28 20,161,230 24 32.34
3 20,151,212 − 360 29.65 29 20,170,111 36 89.71
4 20,151,224 − 348 137.96 30 20,170,123 48 74.42
5 20,160,105 − 336 73.56 31 20,170,204 60 51.89
6 20,160,117 − 324 45.55 32 20,170,216 72 75.17
7 20,160,129 − 312 129.02 33 20,170,228 84 101.15
8 20,160,210 − 300 114.09 34 20,170,312 96 55.73
9 20,160,305 − 276 − 17.17 35 20,170,324 108 80.63
10 20,160,329 − 252 –22.88 36 20,170,405 120 24.78
11 20,160,422 − 228 56.01 37 20,170,417 132 − 35.19
12 20,160,504 − 216 67.34 38 20,170,429 144 61.26
13 20,160,516 − 204 25.32 39 20,170,511 156 − 7.59
14 20,160,528 − 192 27.46 40 20,170,523 168 66.43
15 20,160,609 − 180 43.32 41 20,170,604 180 2.34
16 20,160,703 − 156 31.81 42 20,170,628 204 38.73
17 20,160,808 − 120 22.22 43 20,170,710 216 93.64
18 20,160,820 − 108 35.69 44 20,170,722 228 83.62
19 20,160,913 − 84 36.45 45 20,170,803 240 36.99
20 20,160,925 − 72 − 46.78 46 20,170,815 252 − 25.73
21 20,161,007 − 60 13.69 47 20,170,827 264 7.13
22 20,161,019 − 48 88.96 48 20,170,908 276 86.83
23 20,161,031 − 36 71.44 49 20,170,920 288 47.08
24 20,161,112 − 24 72.06 50 20,171,002 300 29.85
25 20,161,124 − 12 36.76 51 20,171,014 312 − 7.17
26 20,161,206 0 0 52 20,171,028 324 − 18.65

bottom-water multiple scattering signals (red arrows) with low in­
tensity. The signals near the bridge piers (the black point) showed high
coherence and intensity, leading to low-amplitude deviations in SAR
images. While the signals from the middle span (the purple point), which
usually experience severe vibrations, showed low coherence and in­
tensity, leading to larger-amplitude deviations in SAR images.
The background signals of a sea-crossing bridge mainly consist of
three types (in Fig. 6b): the specular reflected signals from the water
surface (the orange arrows) with no signal reflected back to the SAR
satellite; the single scattering signals from ships with temporarily high
coherence and intensity (the purple arrows); and the single and double
scattering signals from artificial island/land with long-term high
coherence and intensity (the pink arrows).
The TerraSAR-X back-scattering signals of the two bridges (in Fig. 7)
show that the distributions and types of bridge back-scattering signals
are related to their observation geometry. When the bridge is almost
parallel to the SAR LOS direction, the SAR back-scattering signals (in
Fig. 7b) comprises mainly single scattering signals directly from the
bridge superstructure, with no multiple scattering signals generated by
the bridge side/bottom and the water surface. When there is a large
angle (such as approximately 65◦ in Fig. 7a) between the bridge orien­
tation and the SAR LOS direction, the SAR back-scattering signals
contain all three types of signals, as the bright lines parallel to the bridge
structure. The closer the angle between the SAR LOS direction and the
bridge orientation is to 90◦ , the more likely the multiple scattering
signals will be generated. Therefore, the single scattering signals can
intuitively indicate the deformation of the bridge structure, as these
signals can be observed in SAR images in any observation geometry.
Based on the bridge back-scattering model, SAR coherent and inco­
herent information is fully combined to extract the permanent-coherent
and partial-coherent scatterers on the bridge structure. For the high-
coherence structure, the coherent information comprises the total

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X. Qin et al. International Journal of Applied Earth Observation and Geoinformation 103 (2021) 102476

Fig. 4. Flowchart of the structure knowledge-InSAR integration approach.

Fig. 5. Flowchart of PTs accurate extraction method.

temporal coherence (with the threshold of 0.7) of the PSI interferometry
dataset, and the incoherent information, such as their average intensity
and amplitude deviation (with the threshold of 0.25 for X-band images
and 0.4 for C-band images), are used to select the permanent-coherent
scatterers on the bridge structure. Different sets of PTs candidates
were selected by the individual coherent and incoherent indicators,
rather than being refined from the previous PTs candidates in the
standard StaMPS PSI processing. Therefore, the number of permanent-
coherent scatterers by merging the individual candidate sets of PTs is
larger than that of the standard StaMPS PSI processing.
Regarding the low-coherent structure, the partial temporal coher­
ence of the SBAS interferometry dataset is used to minimize the effects of
de-correlation, making the partial-coherent scatterers also being
detectable. The quality of interferometry pairs is evaluated by the
average coherence of all pixels (γ i,j ):
1 ∑N
γ i,j = |γ i,j | (1)
N p=1 p
i,j
where N is the number of pixels and γ p is the coherence of the pth pixel.
γ i,j is used to measure the quality of the interference phase of two SAR
images (with the threshold of 0.7). Given the more severe vibrations
experienced by low-coherent structures, new incoherent parameters,
such as the larger amplitude deviation and vibrating noise tolerance, are
set in the subsequent PTs weed process to maximize the number of
detectable partial-coherent scatterers. The PTs selected from the PSI and

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X. Qin et al.
Fig. 6. Bridge foreground-background scattering model in a SAR image.
Fig. 7. TerraSAR-X back-scattering signals of the two bridges.
SBAS interferometry datasets would be different but partially over­
lapping. For each overlapped point, a weighted mean value for the phase
was calculated by summing the phases from both datasets. The SNR
(Signal-to-Noise Ratio) of each dataset was estimated as the weight (Qu
et al., 2015):
1
SNR = (2)
γ−m1 − 1
In the above equation, γm is used to evaluate the phase stability of the
mth point.
3.1.2. Spatial-temporal features consistency-based scatterers refined de-
noising
However, the higher point density should not necessarily be given
priority if it is at the expense of accuracy. Therefore, we have to carefully
balance the number of PTs and their reliability. In this study, the
selected PTs are subject to a refined de-noising via spatial–temporal
feature-matching with the bridge foreground-background scattering
model to distinguish the background signals from the bridge signals.
Firstly, the characteristics of the bridge foreground-background scat­
tering model, such as the spatial distribution, coherence, scattering-
type, and life cycle of the scattering signals, are analyzed to identify
the spatial–temporal differences between the foreground and back­
ground scattering signals of the bridge. Then, the structural-semantic
information of the bridge, comprising its geolocation, elevation, and
structural characteristics, is introduced to identify the exact location of
the main bridge structure, which is used as the spatial constraint when
matching the scatterers to bridge structures. Regarding the geolocation,
PTs falling outside of a local buffer zone of the precise geo-located
bridge in the longitude-latitude plane were excluded. In terms of the
elevation, PTs with elevation estimates that exceed three times the
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International Journal of Applied Earth Observation and Geoinformation 103 (2021) 102476
standard deviation of the surrounding detected points are considered to
be abnormal and filtered out because the elevations of PTs along the
bridge are supposed to be successive.
After separating the background signals from the bridge signals ac­
cording to the differences of their spatial features, the temporal char­
acteristics, including the deformation velocity and time-series
displacements, of PTs are matched with those of the surrounding PTs to
realize a temporal features consistency-based PTs refined de-noising.
The PTs with deformation velocities or maximum deformation values
that obviously distinct (exceed five times the standard deviation) from
the surrounding detected points are considered to be abnormal and
filtered out. Based on the above spatial–temporal de-noising examina­
tion, we believe that the remaining PTs are reliable.
As shown in Fig. 6b, two types of background signals are easy to be
selected as the bridge structural PTs, namely the signals from ships and
artificial islands/land. As the life cycle of the signals from ships is
considerably shorter than that of the bridge structural signals, the
former can be removed by setting an appropriate signal life cycle
threshold. Analogously, as the elevation of the signals from artificial
islands/land is much lower than that of signals from the bridge struc­
ture, the latter can be removed by spatially matching the scatterers with
the structural-semantic information.
3.2. Structural mechanics-InSAR integrated bridge risk-points
identification and refinement
Accurate identification of structural risk-points of sea-crossing
bridges (typically exhibit complex structural stress and deformation
modes) is critical for their scientific management and daily mainte­
nance. Previous InSAR studies primarily inferred the bridge structural
risks according to their deformation measurements, but rarely
X. Qin et al.
Fig. 8. Workflow for structural risk-points identification and refinement.
Fig. 9. PTs selected from TerraSAR-X images on the Stonecutters Bridge.
considered the various safe deformation ranges of different structural
components, leading to high false-alarm/miss-detection rates of struc­
tural risk identification. To address this issue, the deformation risk-
points is firstly identified based on the InSAR spatial–temporal defor­
mation interpretation. The structural mechanics model as well as the
bridge technical specifications are then introduced to extract the load-
bearing risk-points and to remove the false-alarm deformation risk
points, achieving more accurate structural risk-points identification (see
Fig. 8).
3.2.1. InSAR-based deformation risk-points identification
A simple deformation velocity analysis of PTs is insufficient to reveal
the deformation progress of different bridge components. Thus, we also
examine the spatial–temporal deformation characteristics of bridge
structures, such as deformation velocities, time-series deformation
types, deformation gradients, and surrounding deformation distribu­
tions, to identify additional possible structural risk-points on the bridge.
Like most previous studies, we first denote locations with the largest
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International Journal of Applied Earth Observation and Geoinformation 103 (2021) 102476
deformation velocities along the bridge deck as structural risk-points
(such as the 1/2 mid-span points on the Stonecutters Bridge and Tsing
Ma Bridge, etc.). Distinct from previous studies, we select an additional
two types of points as follows. Given the flexible deformation charac­
teristics of sea-crossing bridges, locations with small deformation ve­
locities but with the maximum time-series average displacements and
deformation gradients (such as the 1/3 and 2/3 span points on the
Stonecutters Bridge, etc.) along the bridge deck are further selected as
structural risk-points. Moreover, considering the surrounding deforma­
tion distribution, the positions of bridge components that are directly
affected by the fragile coastal geological environment (such as bridge
tower points) are also selected as the structural risk-points. These points
are the deformation risk-points of the bridge.
3.2.2. Structural mechanics aided load-bearing risk-points refined detection
Next, the structural mechanics model is introduced to assist the
refined detection of structural risk-points. By analyzing the structural
stress characteristics of different bridge structures, the main load-
X. Qin et al.
Fig. 10. TerraSAR-X differential interferograms of the Stonecutters Bridge.
Fig. 11. COSMO-SkyMed differential interferograms of the Stonecutters Bridge.
bearing positions of the bridge, such as the piers and cable-boundaries,
are identified as additional structural risk-points. The mechanisms by
which various structural risk-points cause damage to bridge common
components and load-bearing components are further discussed in detail
based on the integration analysis of the structural mechanics model and
time-series displacements. For example, structural risk-points on bridge
spans would cause cracking on the bridge deck or decrease the me­
chanical strength of cables, but would have less of an effect on bridge
towers, whereas structural risk-points on bridge piers would result in
overall settlement of the bridge.
Then, a comprehensive analysis of overall structural safety is per­
formed by determining the possible extent of damage on the bridge
common and load-bearing components. Based on the “Highway Bridge
Technical Condition Evaluation Standard” (JTGT H21-2011), it can be
determined whether the risk-points on different bridge components
exceed their defined structural safe deformation ranges, and thus help to
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International Journal of Applied Earth Observation and Geoinformation 103 (2021) 102476
reveal the actual risk-points of the bridge and to remove the virtual risk-
points. Therefore, by integrating the structural mechanics model and
InSAR time-series measurements, the reliability of InSAR-based struc­
tural risk-points identification can be improved by removing some lo­
cations with large but elastic deformation that do not threaten the safe
operation of the bridge, and adding some locations with small but un­
recoverable or with continuously increasing deformations on significant
load-bearing components. In this way, the false-alarm/miss-detection
rates of structural risk-points of sea-crossing bridges can be effectively
reduced so as to provide more reliable information for their structural
safety guarantee.
X. Qin et al.
Fig. 12. Vertical deformation velocity maps of the Stonecutters Bridge.
Fig. 13. Vertical deformation profiles of the Stonecutters Bridge derived from TerraSAR-X images.
4. Results and analysis
4.1. Stonecutters bridge
4.1.1. InSAR deformation velocity analysis
The PTs extracted by our proposed method and the StaMPS PSI
method from TerraSAR-X images are represented in Fig. 9. Although the
PTs selected by the conventional PSI method can almost cover the entire
bridge structure, PTs on the low-coherent sections (the yellow ellipses)
are sparse and many background noise signals (the red circles) are also
identified as the structural PTs, leading to low-density and low-precision
of extracted PTs. By using our method, the density of PTs on the low-
coherent sections is markedly increased, and the background noise
signals are removed, increasing the coverage integrity and accuracy of
PTs on the bridge. Our method extracts 7974 PTs, whereas the con­
ventional PSI method extracts 5610 PTs: this about 40% increase in the
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International Journal of Applied Earth Observation and Geoinformation 103 (2021) 102476
number of PTs confirms the effectiveness and feasibility of our method.
The time-series differential interferograms derived from TerraSAR-X
and COSMO-SkyMed datasets are illustrated in Figs. 10 and 11.
Although higher-quality interferograms (with clearer interferometry
fringes) are generated from the TerraSAR-X dataset due to the smaller
spatial–temporal baselines than the COSMO-SkyMed images, the vari­
ations and distributions of interferometry fringes in the two datasets on
the Stonecutters Bridge are in high agreement. If the observed defor­
mation is dominated by the bridge longitudinal deformation, the fringes
should be distributed periodically and transformed continuously or
repeatedly along the bridge deck (Huang et al., 2017; Zhu et al., 2020).
However, the fringes exhibit a symmetric distribution on the bridge
deck, which transformed from the two ends to the middle span. There­
fore, the observed deformation in this study is supposed to be dominated
in the vertical direction.
Moreover, the InSAR technique is considered to have much higher
X. Qin et al.
Fig. 14. Thermal dilation modeling of middle span on the Stonecutters Bridge by TerraSAR-X measurements.
accuracy of deformation monitoring in the vertical direction than in the
horizontal direction because the SAR incidence angle is usually small
(about 30◦ in this study). Therefore, we calculated the vertical defor­
mation from the LOS measurements through an incidence angle-related
geometric transformation (Chang et al., 2018; Wang et al., 2020). The
vertical deformation velocity maps of the Stonecutters Bridge derived
from TerraSAR-X and COSMO-SkyMed images (2011–2012), and from
Sentinel-1A dataset (2015–2017) are illustrated in Fig. 12. The
TerraSAR-X and COSMO-SkyMey results both showed the deformation
velocity ranges of − 26 ~ 8 mm/yr, and their deformation spatial pat­
terns are highly consistent with each other. The mean deformation ve­
locity differences between the TerraSAR-X and COSMO-SkyMed
measurements are about 2 mm/yr for the bridge tower points and 4 mm/
yr for the middle span points, indicating no significant systematic bias
between the two deformation results.
According to Fig. 12, the numbers of PTs extracted from the X-band
TerraSAR-X and COSMO-SkyMed datasets are obviously larger than that
of the C-band Sentinel-1 dataset because the bridges usually showed
more detailed information and lower temporal decorrelation in the X-
band SAR images with higher spatial resolution than C-band images
(Luo et al., 2014). Moreover, in the case of the same spatial resolution, as
the spatial–temporal baselines and coherence of the TerraSAR-X inter­
ferometry pairs are better than the COSMO-SkyMed images in this study,
more PTs are extracted from the TerraSAR-X images than the COSMO-
SkyMed dataset. In all the three deformation velocity maps, more PTs
are extracted around the bridge towers and on two side spans, whereas
fewer are extracted on the main span. The bridge shows a symmetrical
deformation trend, with the deformation velocity gradually increases
from the two towers to the middle span, reaching a maximum velocity at
the middle span.
4.1.2. InSAR time-series displacements interpretation
To explore the detailed deformation model and mechanism, we
calculate the bridge vertical deformation profiles at different observa­
tion times (see Fig. 13). The largest deformation occurs at the middle
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International Journal of Applied Earth Observation and Geoinformation 103 (2021) 102476
span (the red point), whereas the largest deformation gradients occur at
the 1/3 and 2/3 span points of the bridge (the blue points).
The atmosphere temperature of the master image is about 9.8 ◦ C.
Since the structural temperature is considered to be positively correlated
to the atmosphere temperature, the variation of atmosphere tempera­
ture can approximately represent the variation of structural temperature
(Pan et al., 2016). Therefore, the variation of atmosphere temperature is
used to explore the thermal dilation model in this study. When the
temperature is high, such as 31.2 ◦ C and 30.8 ◦ C, the deformation of the
middle span is large. This is because the cables expand at these higher
temperatures, and the longer the cable, the greater the extent of this
thermal expansion. Therefore, the deformation of the main span (mainly
supported by cables) gradually increases from the two towers to the
middle span with the longest cable, and reaches a maximum of
approximately 45 mm. When the temperature is about 20 ◦ C, the
deformation pattern on the main span is similar to those at 31.2 ◦ C and
30.8 ◦ C, but the maximum deformation is reduced to about 25 mm.
When the temperature is about 11.7 ◦ C, with a temperature difference of
about 1.9 ◦ C, the maximum deformation of the bridge declined to less
than 15 mm. Therefore, the deformation of the main span is dominated
by periodic thermal dilation.
According to the time-series differential interferograms of the
Stonecutters Bridge in Figs. 10 and 11, the density of interferometry
fringes is correlated with the temperature difference. When the tem­
perature difference is large, the interferometry fringes are denser,
indicating a greater deformation on the bridge. Moreover, the interfer­
ometry fringes are concentrated near the middle span, indicating that
the deformation increases from the tower to the span, and reaches a
maximum at the middle span. These interferometry fringe-based ana­
lyses are also consistent with the results derived from the time-series
deformation profiles in Fig. 13, which verifies the reliability of the
time-series deformation analysis in this study.
Further quantitative modeling between the middle span deformation
and atmosphere temperature is carried out (see Fig. 14) to explore the
detailed deformation model of the bridge. A linear correlation between
X. Qin et al.
Fig. 15. Structural forces and risk-points of the Stonecutters Bridge.
Fig. 16. Sentinel-1A time-series displacements of structural risk-points on the Stonecutters Bridge.
the time-series deformation and the temperature is observed, with the
correlation coefficient of R2 = 0.79. Compared with the inland river-
crossing bridges, the coastal sea-crossing bridges are more severely
affected by environmental loads (such as heavy rain and typhoons) and
marine corrosion, which exhibit greater vibrations. Therefore, when the
temperature difference is small (<10 ◦ C), the deformation caused by the
environmental factors may be equivalent to the thermal dilation, which
will, sometimes, reduce the linearity of the correlation between the
deformation and temperature (as the red ellipses).
4.1.3. Structure-InSAR integration bridge risk identification
Based on the InSAR spatial–temporal deformation analysis of the
Stonecutters Bridge, two types of structural risk-points are identified:
the middle span points with the largest deformation, and the 1/3 and 2/
3 main span points with the largest deformation gradients.
As a cable-stayed bridge, the Stonecutters Bridge is composed of
pressure-bearing towers, tension cables, and bridge beams (see Fig. 15).
Under external loads (black arrows), the main beam is bent downward
(red dotted line), which causes elongation and deformation of the stay
cables. Then, bridge internal stress (yellow arrows) is generated to
support the main bridge components and transform the loads to the
bridge tower (Xiao et al., 2018). Although the deformations of the cable-
boundary points, tower-beam junctions, and pier points (green, orange,
and purple points) are small, these are also structural risk-points because
they are the main load-bearing components of the bridge and are
directly affected by the fragile coastal geological environment.
In order to further explore the deformation regulars and statistical
characteristics of the deformation at the structural risk points, more
observations are necessary. Although the Sentine-1 images have much
lower spatial resolution compared to TerraSAR-X and COSMO-SkyMed
images, they showed a higher temporal resolution (12 days) than the
high-resolution SAR datasets in this study, and thus can reveal more
detailed time-series displacements of the bridge. Therefore, the Sentinel-
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International Journal of Applied Earth Observation and Geoinformation 103 (2021) 102476
1A time-series displacements (2015–2017) of the structural risk-points
are also calculated (see Fig. 16) for a long-term deformation analysis.
We can see that the Sentinel-1 time-series displacement shows a similar
deformation trend but more severe vibrations than the TerraSAR-X
deformation (in Fig. 14a) due to its higher temporal sampling density
in this study. Therefore, the Sentinel-1 measurements can show more
detailed and continuous bridge deformation, providing more valuable
information for deformation modeling and early-warning.
The time-series displacements of the bridge tower points are weakly
correlated with the temperature (in Fig. 16a) due to the thermal dilation
of the bridge towers. When the temperature increases, the tower ex­
pands, causing the tower points to uplift, whereas when the temperature
decreases, the tower contracts and results in subsidence. The maximum
deformation differences of the two years caused by the thermal dilation
are both approximately 20 mm, indicating that the bridge towers have
stable performance.
Time-series displacements of the span points are also correlated with
the temperature (in Fig. 16b), but in an opposite way to the tower points,
because the mechanism of temperature-induced deformation of the span
points (affected by the thermal dilation of cables) differs from that of the
tower points. When the temperature increases, the cables expand and
cause subsidence of the span points; when the temperature decreases,
the cables contract and result in uplift. The maximum temperature-
induced deformation of the middle span, affected by the expansion
rate difference of the towers and cables (Pan et al., 2016), increased
from 45 mm to 55 mm, which would be due to the reduced stiffness of
the cable system or towers. However, the InSAR measurements only
reveal the preliminary variation trend in deformation, and additional
observations are needed to further investigate the exact deformation
trends and related reasons.
Based on the above analysis, although the load-bearing risk-points
underwent deformation during the observation period, our long-term
deformation analysis indicates that they remain in a dynamic
X. Qin et al. International Journal of Applied Earth Observation and Geoinformation 103 (2021) 102476

Fig. 17. PTs selected from TerraSAR-X images on the Tsing Ma Bridge.

Fig. 18. TerraSAR-X differential interferograms of the Tsing Ma Bridge.

Fig. 19. Vertical deformation velocity map of the Tsing Ma Bridge.

equilibrium state and the performance of the piers is stable. However,
the deformation of the span points increased from 2015 to 2017, which
may indicate the stiffness decrease of the cable system or towers.
Therefore, the structural risk-points on the span (such as the 1/3, 1/2,
and 2/3 span points) of the Stonecutters Bridge must be further
monitoring.
4.2. Tsing Ma bridge
4.2.1. InSAR deformation velocity analysis
The PTs selected on the Tsing Ma Bridge by our method and the
StaMPS PSI method are shown in Fig. 17. The conventional PSI method
fails to extract PTs from two sections on the main span (the yellow

12
X. Qin et al. International Journal of Applied Earth Observation and Geoinformation 103 (2021) 102476

Fig. 20. Vertical deformation profiles of the Tsing Ma Bridge derived from the TerraSAR-X images.

Fig. 21. Thermal dilation modeling of span points on the Tsing Ma Bridge by TerraSAR-X measurements.

ellipses) and incorrectly extracts noise signals as the structural PTs (the two low-coherent sections and removed background noise signals,
red circles), which would lead to incomplete deformation monitoring improving the density and coverage integrity of PTs on the bridge (7053
and phase estimation errors. Our method extracts continuous PTs on the PTs), which is approximately 40% better than the conventional PSI

13
X. Qin et al. International Journal of Applied Earth Observation and Geoinformation 103 (2021) 102476

Fig. 22. Structural forces and risk-points of the Tsing Ma Bridge.

Fig. 23. Sentinel-1A time-series deformation of the structural risk-points on the Tsing Ma Bridge.

Table 4 Table 5
Deformation characteristics comparison of the two bridges. Technical standard of cable-supported bridges.
Deformation characteristics Stonecutters Bridge Tsing Ma Bridge Level Qualitative Quantitative

PTs Similarities Dense on side spans and bridge towers, sparse on the 1 Security Intact Deformation = 0
distribution main span 2 General Deformation less than thresholds Maximum deflection < 1/
Differences Denser and more Sparser and less uniform risk 800 span
uniform 3 High risk Obvious deformation on the main 1/800 span < maximum
Reasons Different material properties, structural stabilities beam deflection < 1/500 span
and SAR observation geometries 4 Significant Serious deformation on the main Maximum deflection > 1/
Deformation Similarities Stable on side spans and bridge towers, deformation risk beam, abnormal movement 500 span
pattern increases from towers to middle span observed
Differences Symmetrical Asymmetrical
deformation: Largest deformation: Largest
deformation (1/2 deformation (1/2 span images are illustrated in Fig. 19, both showed the deformation velocity
span); largest and 150-m east of 1/2
ranges of − 26 ~ 10 mm/yr. During the two observation periods, the
deformation gradient span); largest
(1/3 and 2/3 span) deformation gradient
Qing-Yi Tower remain stable, whereas the Ma-Wan Tower showed slight
(about 1/6 and 5/7 subsidence of about − 8mm/yr. This may be because the Qing-Yi Tower
span) is located on Qing-Yi Island, while the Ma-Wan Tower is located on a
Reasons Different structural symmetries and structural newly-built artificial island in the sea, which experienced continuous
flexibilities
consolidation and compression.
Structural Similarities Slight deformation on load-bearing risk-points,
risk-points large deformation on deformation risk-points The number of PTs selected from the TerraSAR-X images are larger
Differences Symmetrically Asymmetrically than those selected from the Sentinel-1 images due to the larger amount
distributed distributed of information and higher resolution of X-band images. However, the
Reasons Different structural symmetries and structural PTs selected from the Sentinel-1 images distributed more uniform on the
forces
main span, which may be because the X-band images are more sensitive
to the random vibrations of the span and thus lead to more severe
method (5029 PTs). decorrelation effects than the C-band images (Yang et al., 2018).
The time-series differential interferograms of the Tsing Ma Bridge Therefore, the densities of TerraSAR-X PTs on some vibration sections
derived from the TerraSAR-X dataset is illustrated in Fig. 18. Similar to are smaller than those of the Sentinel-1 PTs. In both results, more PTs are
the Stonecutters Bridge, we found that the fringes are obviously trans­ extracted on the side spans and near the towers than on the main span
formed from the two ends to the middle span, which indicate that the because the main span of Tsing Ma Bridge undergoes more severe vi­
deformation observed in this study is dominated in the vertical brations under environmental effects and has much lower coherence. By
direction. using the coherent/incoherent information combined method, dense
The vertical deformation velocity maps of the Tsing Ma Bridge and continuous PTs are extracted from such low-coherent sections,
derived from TerraSAR-X (2011–2012) and Sentinel-1 (2015–2017) providing a more complete deformation of the bridge structure.

14
X. Qin et al.
Fig. 24. Empirical density distributions of bridge deformation.
4.2.2. InSAR time-series displacements interpretation
Time-series vertical deformation profiles derived from the TerraSAR-
X images (see Fig. 20) along the bridge deck are calculated to explore the
detailed deformation model of the bridge. The deformation gradually
increases from the two towers towards the middle span, and reaches the
maximum at the middle span and 150-m east of the middle span. A
correlation between the bridge deformation and atmosphere tempera­
ture is found: when the temperature increases, the deformation of the
span increases, and vice versa. When the temperature is low (about 11.7
◦
C), the maximum deformation of the span is approximately 15 mm.
When the temperature is higher (about 20 ◦ C and 30 ◦ C), the maximum
deformations of the span are approximately 40 and 65 mm.
According to the TerraSAR-X differential interferograms of the Tsing
Ma Bridge in Fig. 20, when the atmosphere temperature difference is
small (about 2 ◦ C), the interferogram fringes on the bridge change
slowly, indicating a small deformation on the span. When the temper­
ature difference increases (about 10 ◦ C and 20 ◦ C), the interferogram
fringes on the bridge become denser, indicating larger deformations on
the span. Therefore, there is a direct correlation between the bridge
deformation and the temperature, which is consistent with the analysis
of the time-series deformation profiles.
A linear correlation between the atmosphere temperature and the
middle span deformation of the Tsing Ma Bridge is found (see Fig. 21),
with a correlation coefficient of R2 = 0.83. When the temperature dif­
ference is large (≥ 10 ◦ C), the thermal dilation is much larger than the
vibration deformation caused by environmental effects. Thus, the ther­
mal dilation dominates the total deformation which is therefore highly
consistent with the model-fitted thermal dilation. However, when the
temperature difference is small (<10 ◦ C), the thermal dilation is small
and approximately equal to the vibration deformation. Thus, the total
deformation is not dominated by the thermal dilation, leading to large
discrepancies between the observed values and the model-fitted thermal
dilation (the red ellipses).
4.2.3. Structure-InSAR integration bridge risk identification
The spatial–temporal deformation characteristics indicates two types
of structural risk-points on the Tsing Ma Bridge: the maximum defor­
mation and maximum deformation gradient points along the bridge (the
red and blue points in Fig. 20).
Structurally, the Tsing Ma Bridge is composed of main cables, main
towers, stiffening beams and other features (see Fig. 22). The main cable
bears most of the tension (yellow arrows) and can balance the system by
altering its geometric shape. The two towers are the main load-bearing
components of the bridge against vertical loads (black arrows), and the
stiffening beam largely bears internal bending forces (Chang, 2011). The
force analysis of the Tsing Ma Bridge reveals that the cable-beam junc­
tions (green points with the greatest tension on the main cable) and the
tower-beam junctions (orange points with the largest compression under
vertical loads) are also structural risk-points.
However, the one-year TerraSAR-X results are too short to support
the long-term deformation regulars and statistical characteristics
15
International Journal of Applied Earth Observation and Geoinformation 103 (2021) 102476
analysis of different structural risk points. Therefore, time-series dis­
placements derived from Sentinel-1A images with longer observation
time (2015–2017) and higher temporal sampling density (12 days) are
also analyzed in Fig. 23. Compared with the time-series displacements of
TerraSAR-X images in Fig. 21a, the Sentinel-1 displacement shows
similar deformation trend but more detail and continuous deformation
during the observation period.
The time-series displacements of the bridge tower points are posi­
tively correlated with the temperature (in Fig. 23a) due to the thermal
expansion and contraction of the bridge towers (similar to the Stone­
cutters Bridge). We found that the annual maximum deformation dif­
ference of the bridge tower points in 2017 (35 mm) is larger than 2016
(26 mm), which might be due to the reduce of the bridge stiffness.
However, the InSAR results just reveal the preliminary phenomenon in
the time-series deformation, more observations are needed to support a
quantitative analysis and find out the exact reasons.
The deformation mechanism of span points, although also associated
with temperature, is different from that of tower points. When the
temperature increases, the cables expand, leading to the subsidence of
the span points, whereas when the temperature decreases, the cables
contract and result in a slight uplift. The annual maximum deformation
differences of the span points during 2016 and 2017 are almost iden­
tical, indicating no apparent mechanical damage on the cables.
The time-series deformation of risk-points shows that the mechanical
properties of the cables are stable, whereas the stiffness of the bridge
towers may deteriorate, which requires more observations to confirm.
Therefore, the tower-beam junctions and cable-beam junctions are the
main structural risk-points on the Tsing Ma Bridge.
5. Discussion
5.1. Deformation characteristics comparison
The comparison of the PTs distributions, deformation patterns, and
structural risk-points between the two bridges are shown in Table 4.
Compared with the StaMPS PSI method, the SAR coherent/inco­
herent combined method developed in this study extracts a greater
number of more accurate PTs upon the two sea-crossing bridges, which
yield more detailed information of each bridge. The PTs on the Stone­
cutters Bridge are more continuous than the Tsing Ma Bridge because
the Stonecutters Bridge (steel-structured) shows stronger back-
scattering and higher coherence in SAR images than the concrete-
structured Tsing Ma Bridge. Moreover, the suspension bridge (a vari­
able system) is less stable and exhibits more severe vibration than the
cable-stayed bridge (a three-rigid-piece stable system) under environ­
mental loads, and it is thus more difficult to extract reliable PTs on the
suspension bridge. Thirdly, the SAR observation time of the Stonecutters
Bridge (about 65◦ between the TerraSAR-X LOS and bridge orientation)
is longer than the Tsing Ma Bridge (approximately 10◦ between the
TerraSAR-X LOS and bridge orientation), which results in more infor­
mation and denser PTs being extractable on the Stonecutters Bridge.
X. Qin et al.
Therefore, the distribution of InSAR PTs extracted on a sea-crossing
bridge is closely related to the material properties, structural charac­
teristics, and observation geometries of the bridge.
The Stonecutters Bridge is a symmetrical structure with a symmet­
rical vertical deformation trend that increases from the two towers to the
main span. The deformation maximizes at the middle span, and the
deformation gradient maximizes at the 1/3 and 2/3 main span positions.
The side spans, constrained by piers and cables, are more stable than the
main span only supported by cables. The Tsing Ma Bridge exhibits a
similar vertical deformation tendency to the Stonecutters Bridge.
However, its deformation is asymmetrically distributed, with the
maximum deformation occurs at the middle span and also 150-m east of
the middle span, which would be due to the structural asymmetry of this
bridge. Therefore, although these two bridges exhibit similar deforma­
tion trends, their specific structural characteristics lead to unique
deformation spatial distributions.
Two types of structural risk-points are identified on the two sea-
crossing bridges: load-bearing risk-points and deformation risk-points.
The structural risk-points of the Stonecutters Bridge are symmetrically
distributed, including the cable-boundary points, tower-beam junctions,
and the 1/3, 1/2, and 2/3 main span points. The structural risk-points of
the Tsing Ma Bridge are asymmetrically distributed, including the cable-
beam junctions, tower-beam junctions, the 1/2 span point, the 150-m
east of the middle span, and the two positions with the largest defor­
mation gradient. Although the structural risk-points of the two bridges
are non-identical, they share some characteristics. Firstly, the de­
formations at their load-bearing risk-points are small, which primarily
reflects the permanent deformation trends of the overall structure under
static loads. Moreover, their deformation risk-points exhibit large but
recoverable deformations, revealing the periodic deformation trends of
the flexible bridge components under dynamic loads.
5.2. Structure-InSAR integration bridge risk assessment
The “Highway Bridge Technical Condition Evaluation Standard”
√̅̅̅
(JTGT H21-2011) defined the allowable deformation of piers (2 Lcm),
and the maximum deformation difference threshold on a span ( Lcm). L
√̅̅̅
is the minimum span length between two adjacent piers. Our results
show that the maximum deformation of piers (about 10 mm) and the
maximum deformation difference of piers (about 8 mm) on the Stone­
√̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅
cutters Bridge are less than the standards of 16.73 cm (2 Lside− span ) and
√̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅
8.15 cm ( Lside− span ). Those of the Tsing Ma Bridge are about 15 mm and
√̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅
5 mm, which are less than the standards of 16.97 cm (2 Lside− span ) and
√̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅̅
8.48 cm ( Lside− span ). The safety evaluation standard for mid-span
deflection of cable-supported bridges in the (JTGT H21-2011) in
Table 5 states that the span deflection also affects the bridge structural
safety. The maximum middle span deflections of the Stonecutters Bridge
are approximately 45 mm (2011–2012) and 55 mm (2015–2017), which
are less than 1.27 m (1/800 span). Those of the Tsing Ma Bridge are
about 68 mm, which is less than 1.72 m (1/800 span).
The empirical density distributions of deformation at piers and
middle spans on the two bridges are calculated based on the InSAR
measurements (as illustrated in Fig. 24) without assuming that the
measurements obey a specific distribution in advance (Zhang et al.,
2011). The average deformation of piers and the maximum deformation
of span points on the Tsing Ma Bridge are larger than those of the
Stonecutters Bridge, which would be due to the different structural and
material properties of these two bridges. The estimated empirical den­
sity distributions of deformation at the structural risk-points are similar
to the normal distribution (but slightly changed due to the random and
complex environmental effects), and showed that the maximum defor­
mation of pier points (mm-level) and span points (cm-level) on the two
bridges are still much less than their allowable thresholds.
According to the technical standards in Table 5, the two bridges are
evaluated at the safety level 2 (general risk), which means the two
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International Journal of Applied Earth Observation and Geoinformation 103 (2021) 102476
bridges are relatively stable and can operate normally in the short term.
However, the increase in the span deflection (from 45 mm to 55 mm) on
the Stonecutters Bridge and the increase in the pier deformation range
(from 20 mm to 35 mm) on the Tsing Ma Bridge may indicate the
deterioration of their different bridge components, and thus further
monitoring must be performed to prevent the potential security risks.
6. Conclusion
This study explores the utility of a method that integrates structural
knowledge and InSAR measurements for high-precision deformation
monitoring and risk identification of sea-crossing bridges. This new
method is applied to the Stonecutters Bridge and Tsing Ma Bridge with
the X-band TerraSAR-X and COSMO-SkyMed images and C-band
Sentinel-1 data, and the results are superior to those generated by
traditional InSAR methods. Comparing the results derived from the X-
band commercial SAR data and the C-band free SAR data, although the
Sentinel-1 data exhibit lower density in PTs distribution due to its lower
spatial resolution, it shows good potential in more detailed and
continuous time-series bridge deformation monitoring due to the higher
temporal sampling density, and thus can provide more valuable infor­
mation for temporal deformation modeling and early-warning.
The densities of PTs extracted on the two bridges using the new
method are approximately 40% greater than those extracted by the
StaMPS PSI method, and the incorrect noise signals are removed.
Moreover, the mechanical properties of different bridge components are
evaluated through the analysis of their structural stress characteristics
and time-series deformation, and thus decrease the false-alarm/miss-
detection rates of InSAR-based structural risk identification. The defor­
mation spatial distribution of the two sea-crossing bridges is closely
related to their structural characteristics, and the deformation temporal
evolution is correlated with the temperature when the temperature
difference is large (≥10 ◦ C), but no longer dominated by thermal dila­
tion when the temperature difference is less than 10 ◦ C. Cross-validation
between the TerraSAR-X and COSMO-SkyMed results confirms the ac­
curacy and reliability of our results.
There is a symmetrical deformation trend along the Stonecutters
Bridge, with the largest deformation occurs at the 1/2 span (decreases
towards the two bridge towers) and the largest deformation gradient
occurs at the 1/3 and 2/3 span. The Tsing Ma Bridge exhibits a similar
but asymmetrical deformation tendency. The largest deformation occurs
at the 1/2 span and 150-m east of the 1/2 span, and the largest defor­
mation gradient occurs at about the 1/6 and 5/7 span. Although the
deformation distributions of the two bridges are different, they have the
same types of structural risk-points: load-bearing risk-points and
deformation risk-points. Even if small deformations occur at the load-
bearing structural points, they must be extensively investigated, as
such deformations usually indicate damage on the bridge foundation.
However, the deformation of the main span is usually recoverable and
thus does not necessarily indicate the structural damage. Rather, it is the
increase in the maximum deformation range that may indicate de­
teriorations of different bridge components.
CRediT authorship contribution statement
Xiaoqiong Qin: Conceptualization, Methodology, Writing - original
draft. Qingquan Li: Project administration, Supervision. Xiaoli Ding:
Project administration, Supervision. Linfu Xie: . Chisheng Wang:
Visualization, Investigation, Writing - review & editing. Mingsheng
Liao: Validation. Lu Zhang: Validation. Bochen Zhang: . Siting Xiong:
.
Declaration of Competing Interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing financial
interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence
X. Qin et al.
the work reported in this paper.
Acknowledgement
This work is supported by the Guangdong Research Fund
[2019A1515111163, 2019A1515110729], the Open Research Fund of
State Key Laboratory of Information Engineering in Surveying, Mapping
and Remote Sensing [20R06, 20E02], the China Postdoctoral Science
Foundation [2019M660210, 2020T130429], the Key Laboratory of
Land Satellite Remote Sensing Application, MNR of China [KLSMNR-
202101], and the National Natural Science Foundation of China
[42001407, 41974006]. Thanks for the COSMO-SkyMed and TerraSAR-
X images provided by the Hong Kong PolyU.
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