Assuming a link-slab of 5% the length of each adjacent deck
Assuming a link-slab of 5% the length of each adjacent deck slab as suggested by Caner and Zia
[4],the imposed tensile strain related to imposed deformation by temperature,live load and
shrinkage is calculated to be around 1.6%,adopting a factor of safety of two [5].This implies
that cracking in concrete link-slabs is inevitable since normal concrete has a tensile strain capacity
of 0.01%.Furthermore,cyclic fatigue loading due to traffic movements may be expected to widen
the width of concrete cracks over time [6].