###### Abstract  
To investigate the seismic behavior of the wall pier of a covered bridge, the multi-layer shell element in OpenSEES was used to carry out the numerical analysis under a horizontal low cyclic loading in the weak axis direction. The effects of the mesh divisions of the wall pier models were evaluated and the hysteretic curves, skeleton curves, bearing and energy dissipation capacity, stiffness degradation and displacement ductility of the wall pier with different lateral loading modes were mainly researched. The results demonstrate that the discretization of layers along the thickness direction of the multi-layer shell element model has a very limited effect on the hysteretic and skeleton curves. The mesh division of the horizontal direction depends on that of the vertical, and the vertical mesh spacing shall be longer than the plastic hinge with a length of 0.5744 m. The arrangement of the loading points is critical for the seismic behavior of the wall pier. The pier suffering the force from the five points presents a relatively strong energy dissipation and larger ductility, but this layout may cause a more concentrated force at the local position. When the loading points are evenly distributed, the capacity and displacement changes sharply and the ductility diminishes. Successively, the seismic performance indexes at the local position of the wall pier tend to be more consistent with the increasing loading points. The deformation and energy dissipation capacity of the nearby position with the denser side loading points becomes larger, but this has a minor impact on the seismic performance of the position far from the points. The wall pier without the bent cap and with three bearings set is supposed to be more reasonable for the covered bridge through the overall analysis of seismic performance. c 2022  
elastic modulus was used to consider the effects of reinforcement joint degradation and bond slip at the bottom of the wall. [PERSON] [4] performed a nonlinear static pushover analysis and dynamic time analysis of the wall pier using the fiber element in SeismoStruct. Since wall piers are similar to shear walls and railway piers in terms of structural form and force characteristics, [PERSON] et al. [5] adopted a layered shell element to simulate the piers of a typical simply supported girder bridge and verified the accuracy of the shell element by the test results of shear walls. For railway piers, [PERSON] [6] selected the separated modeling method in ABAQUS to analyze the elastic-plastic seismic response of the round-end-shaped solid piers of a high-speed railway, in which the three-dimensional truss element and the three-dimensional solid element were adopted for the reinforcement and the concrete, respectively. [PERSON] et al. [7] established four finite element models for a railway bridge using the multi-vertical-line element, the beam element and the slab element, respectively, and carried out seismic response analysis of gravity piers and compared the results, suggesting that it is reasonable to choose the multi-vertical-line element model to simulate railway piers. [PERSON] et al. [8] conducted an experimental study in the longitudinal and transverse directions on the seismic performance of round-ended railway piers with low shear span ratio. The applicability of the Chang-Mander concrete constitutive model to simulate railway piers with large cross-sections and low reinforcement ratios was investigated based on the test results. [PERSON] [9] established the finite element model of a high-speed railway pier using the solid element of ANSYS, compared it with the experimental data to verify the correctness of the model and analyzed the ductility and failure of the piers with different parameters. [PERSON] et al. [10] utilized the frame element in SAP2000 to conduct pushover analysis on the piers of the railway bridge connecting the SantaMesa and Pandacan stations and derived the fragility curves of the railway bridge.