Reduced-order models for vertical human-structure interaction

For slender and lightweight structures, the vibration serviceability under crowd- induced loading is often critical in design. Currently, designers rely on equivalent load models, upscaled from single-person force measurements. Furthermore, it is important to consider the mechanical interaction with the human body as this can significantly reduce the structural response. To account for these interaction effects, the contact force between the pedestrian and the structure can be modelled as the superposition of the force induced by the pedestrian on a rigid floor and the force resulting from the mechanical interaction between the structure and the human body. For the case of large crowds, however, this approach leads to models with a very high system order. In the present contribution, two equivalent reduced-order models are proposed to approximate the dynamic behaviour of the full-order coupled crowd-structure system. A numerical study is performed to evaluate the impact of the modelling assumptions on the structural response to pedestrian excitation. The results show that the full-order moving crowd model can be well approximated by a reduced-order model whereby the interaction with the pedestrians in the crowd is modelled using a single (equivalent) SDOF system.