U.S. PREPAREDNESS INCHES FORWARD

The article describes how governments across the country are addressing the potential costs of implementing seismic design codes for new structures. Efforts in Illinois and New York, California, and South Carolina are described. In New York, although buildings designed to the City's 1968 code are considered to be safe, other factors such as detailing costs, soil conditions and probabilities for the East Coast will be addressed. Soils in the East are more likely to experience liquefaction and slope failure than in the West even from earthqakes of magnitudes 5 or 6. Also, because ground motion amplification is proportional to the amount of soft sediment overlying bedrock, East Coast earthquake waves propagate much farther. Regional differences could cause different degrees of damage across the country. Tennessee is accelerating adoption of guidelines based on the 1988 Uniform Building Code, which contains strong seismic design provisions. The efforts of two other building code groups is described: the Building Officials and Code Administrators International, and the Southern Building Code Congress International. The National Earthquake Hazards Reduction Program's "Recommended Provisions for the Development of Seisminc Regulations for New Buildings" is discussed.

• Availability:
  • Find a library where document is available. Order URL: http://worldcat.org/issn/08919526
• Corporate Authors:

  McGraw-Hill, Incorporated

  330 West 42nd Street
  New York, NY  United States  10036
• Publication Date: 1989-11-9

Media Info

• Pagination: p. 17-18
• Serial:
  • ENR
  • Volume: 223
  • Issue Number: 19
  • Publisher: McGraw-Hill, Incorporated
  • ISSN: 0891-9526

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Building codes; Earthquake resistant design; Earthquake resistant structures; Earthquakes; Liquefaction; Seismicity; Slope stability; Soft rock; Soils; Structural design
• Uncontrolled Terms: Soil conditions
• Old TRIS Terms: Seismic properties
• Subject Areas: Bridges and other structures; Geotechnology; Highways; Law; I20: Design and Planning of Transport Infrastructure;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 00489440
• Record Type: Publication
• Files: TRIS
• Created Date: Nov 30 1989 12:00AM