Derivation of empirical formulations predicting the scouring depth around the bridge piers and comparing them with the existent formulations in the literature.

Local scouring around bridge piers is one of the most common causes of bridge failure, possibly resulting in significant economic and human losses. However, due to the various elements that go into this process, predicting the exact depth of local scouring is challenging. The major goal of this research is to develop empirical formulas for predicting the local depth of scouring around a bridge pier using gene expression programming (GEP), a contemporary fine computing modeling approach. The empirical equations were derived using a variety of critical factors, including pier form, flow depth, flow intensity, pier width, and flow direction angle. All of these factors were derived from the dimensional analysis. Several trials were conducted for two case studies to predict empirical formulas. Each trial results different statistical measurements and each trial modified model building the model variables. The proposed empirical equations give successful predication results, the result of this study is believed to be well used by the researchers who deal with empirical modeling of the scouring around bridge piers.