To solve the problem of low accuracy in damage identification caused by using single sensor time-domain data directly as input for a convolutional neural network, a convolutional neural network identification method based on wavelet packet transform and fast Fourier transform is proposed. Taking the dataset measured in the field experiment on a short steel bridge as an example, single sensor data samples are transformed using DWPT and FFT respectively, and the transformed data are used to train the 1D-CNN network. The test accuracy of the trained network is obviously improved, and its recognition accuracy is higher than that of multiple sensor data directly as input. At the same time, the recognition of noise samples and data from sensors that have not participated in network training in structure is analyzed. The results show that the time-frequency transformation of noise samples before training the network can significantly improve the recognition accuracy of noise samples, and can improve the problem that the trained network is difficult to identify data from the sensor that have not participated in network training. Finally, the above conclusions are further demonstrated by test data from the grandstand of Qatar University.