Optimum column layout design of reinforced concrete frames under wind loading

The geometric layout optimization of a structure is a significant stage in a design process, and selecting an appropriate geometric layout can impact all the subsequent stages of the design procedure and the relevant costs. This study presents a heuristic approach for the optimum layout design of two-dimensional reinforced concrete frames in order to optimize the total cost and controls the application under wind loadings. The aim is to find the optimum column layout design for 2D frames under wind loadings considering the involved cost elements. A heuristic methodology is developed in order to achieve a new design space and an objective function for the cost and layout optimization problem. The proposed method has the capability to make use of action effects of the structure as alternative design variables in place of the commonly used cross-sectional ones. Such a feature provides the method the ability to be easily employed in large and realistic structural optimization problems, and helps the optimization algorithms to take less time, in an iterative optimization process. Then, an Ant System based algorithm is proposed to solve the presented optimization problem. Examples are included to illustrate the robustness of the methodology.