PROJECT OVERVIEW

Title: Community Action Plan for Seismic Safety (CAPSS) Project

Client: San Francisco Department of Building Inspection (DBI)

Status: Completed in 2010

Final Products: Available through the ATC office and for download at the link below.

Potential Earthquake Impacts (ATC-52-1 Report), which focuses on estimating impacts to the City’s privately owned buildings in future earthquakes; and the companion Technical Documentation volume (ATC-52-1A Report), which contains descriptions of the technical analyses that were conducted to produce the impact estimates;

A Community Action Plan for Seismic Safety (ATC-52-2 Report), which recommends policies to reduce earthquake risk in privately owned buildings of all types;

Earthquake Safety for Soft-Story Buildings (ATC-52-3 Report), which describes the risk of one vulnerable building type and recommends policies to reduce that risk, and the companion Documentation Appendices volume (ATC-52-3A Report), which details the technical methods and data used to develop the policy recommendations and related analyses; and

Post-earthquake Repair and Retrofit Requirements (ATC-52-4 Report), which recommends clarifications as to how owners should repair and strengthen their damaged buildings after an earthquake.

PROJECT SUMMARY

ATC-52-2 Project.  The Community Action Plan for Seismic Safety (CAPSS) project of the San Francisco Department of Building Inspection (DBI), carried out by ATC, was created to provide DBI and other City agencies and policymakers with a plan of action or policy road map to reduce earthquake risks in existing, privately-owned buildings that are regulated by the Department, and also to develop repair and rebuilding guidelines that will expedite recovery after an earthquake. Risk reduction activities will only be implemented and will only succeed if they make sense financially, culturally and politically, and are based on technically sound information. CAPSS engaged community leaders, earth scientists, social scientists, economists, tenants, building owners, and engineers to find out which mitigation approaches make sense in all of these ways and could, therefore, be good public policy.

Early phases of the CAPSS project, which commenced in 2000, involved planning and conducting an initial earthquake impacts study.  The final phase of work, which is described and documented in the report series, Here Today—Here Tomorrow: The Road to Earthquake Resilience in San Francisco, began in April of 2008 and was completed at the end of 2010.

Six CAPSS reports are available in the series, Here Today—Here Tomorrow: The Road to Earthquake Resilience in San Francisco:

• Potential Earthquake Impacts (ATC-52-1 Report), which focuses on estimating impacts to the City’s privately owned buildings in future earthquakes; and the companion Technical Documentation volume (ATC-52-1A Report), which contains descriptions of the technical analyses that were conducted to produce the impact estimates;
• A Community Action Plan for Seismic Safety (ATC-52-2 Report), which recommends policies to reduce earthquake risk in privately owned buildings of all types;
• Earthquake Safety for Soft-Story Buildings (ATC-52-3 Report), which describes the risk of one vulnerable building type and recommends policies to reduce that risk, and the companion Documentation Appendices volume (ATC-52-3A Report), which details the technical methods and data used to develop the policy recommendations and related analyses; and
• Post-earthquake Repair and Retrofit Requirements (ATC-52-4 Report), which recommends clarifications as to how owners should repair and strengthen their damaged buildings after an earthquake.

All six reports and other information about the CAPSS project are available here.

PROJECT OVERVIEW

Title: Technical Assistance and Documentation of Case Studies, FEMA Guidelines for the Design of Structures for Vertical Evacuation From Tsunamis

Client: Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA)

Status: Completed in May 2012.

Participants: To see a list of project participants, click here.

Related Projects and Reports: The final product of the ATC-79/79-1 project is an updated version of the FEMA P-646 Report, Guidelines for the Design of Structures for Vertical Evacuation From Tsunamis (published in 2008, prepared for FEMA by ATC). 

PROJECT SUMMARY

This project involved the technical review and update of the FEMA P-646 Report,Guidelines for the Design of Structures for Vertical Evacuation From Tsunamis.  Following its publication in 2008, the document was used in conceptual design studies as part of tsunami evacuation planning in Cannon Beach, Oregon and the document’s design guidance was evaluated in ongoing research related to the development of Performance-Based Tsunami Engineering conducted at the University of Hawaii at Manoa, under the National Science Foundation-sponsored George E. Brown, Jr. Network for Earthquake Engineering Simulation (NEES) program.  Based on findings from these activities, FEMA initiated a follow-up project with ATC in 2009 to review the design guidance contained in FEMA P-646, and to consider updates, if needed, based on this new information.  As a result of this review, selected revisions were deemed necessary.  In March 2011, the devastating Tohoku tsunami struck Japan, providing a wealth of additional information that could be considered for inclusion in the update of the FEMA P-646 Report. 

The project was completed in May 2012, with the issuance of a Second Edition of the FEMA P-646 Report.  Technical updates contained in this Second Edition include: (1) observations and lessons learned from the March 11, 2011 Tohoku tsunami; (2) revision of the debris impact expression to remove over-conservatism deemed to be present in the prior edition; (3) additional explanation of the definition of tsunami elevation as it relates to run-up elevation used in tsunami force equations; and (4) an update of reference documents to the most current version.

The final product of this project is an updated FEMA P-646 Report, Guidelines for the Design of Structures for Vertical Evacuation From Tsunamis, Second Edition.  The FEMA P-646 report is available for free download here.

PROJECT OVERVIEW

Client: Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA)

Final Product: We are pleased to announce the release of ROVER (Rapid Observation of Vulnerability and Estimation of Risk), a FEMA-sponsored smartphone application for building professionals (engineers, architects, firefighters, building officials, and others) to do rapid pre- and post-earthquake hazard evaluation of buildings. ROVER brings the advantages of smartphones to the de-facto paper-based standards for rapid pre-earthquake screening and post-earthquake safety tagging of buildings with red (unsafe), yellow (restricted use), or green (inspected) placards (i.e., FEMA 154 procedures for rapid visual screening of buildings for potential seismic hazards, and ATC-20 procedures for postearthquake safety evaluation of buildings). These procedures have been used on hundreds of thousands of buildings, beginning with ATC-20 inspections after the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake near San Francisco. ROVER adds the efficiency of built-in soil and seismology geodatabases, unlimited watermarked and captioned digital photos, automatic geolocation, real-time process control, a secure web-accessible database, integration with the U. S. Geological Survey software, ShakeCast, for real-time earthquake monitoring and with HAZUS-MH (FEMA multi-hazard damage and loss estimation software) for prospective risk analysis, and other features. ROVER can inform emergency preparation, business continuity planning related to natural disaster, disaster management, and broader efforts for sustainable building. ROVER has already been successfully tested by the Los Angeles Unified School District, the Utah Seismic Safety Commission, and others. Visit www.ROVERReady.org to download the software and to view assessments by independent testers of the software. The software can also be ordered on CD from the FEMA Publications Warehouse: Call 1-800-480-2520 and ask for "FEMA P-154 ROVER CD." See details here.

ROVER was developed for FEMA by the Applied Technology Council, in collaboration with specialists form SPA Risk LLC, and Instrumental Software Technologies Inc., and a professional review panel of leading building officials, scholars, and practitioners.

PROJECT OVERVIEW

Title: Methodology to Assess and Verify the Seismic Capacity of Low-Rise Buildings

Project Status: Completed

Client: Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA)

PROJECT SUMMARY

This project seeks to conduct the first phase of a multi-phase project to eventually develop an alternative seismic design approach for low-rise construction in the United States that similarly utilizes non-linear response analysis results in a simplified displacement-based approach.  The approach would ideally incorporate a computing tool or analytical engine (similar to the tool developed for FEMA P-807) using the large amount of dynamic analysis data that has already been generated.  Rather than calculating an equivalent lateral force as prescribed in ASCE/SEI 7, such an approach would utilize the assessed nonlinear response characteristics of the building to select and size the seismic-force-resisting system.  

One challenge in implementing such an approach would be to validate it against the performance of standard code-designed buildings and demonstrate that the seismic performance intent of current U.S. model building codes and standards are met.  The FEMA P-695 report, Quantification of Building Seismic Performance Factors, provides a methodology that can be used to validate the performance equivalency of alternative design procedures.  To be generally useful and nationally applicable, an alternative design procedure would need to be verified for a variety of: (a) seismic-force-resisting systems; (b) site classes and seismic hazards; and (c) range of building configurations.  This validation effort would require the pre-determination of applicable building heights and structural system types, and a comparison of these parameters with the Canadian study parameters to determine which of the Canadian study data can be used, and what, if any, new data must be developed.

Task 1: Develop Initial Methodology for Validation on Selected Systems.  This task involves the investigation of the development of an initial methodology for simplified design of low-rise buildingsbased on the methodology developed on the Canadian project. 

Subtask 1.1 – Review Information from Related Projects

The Project Management Committee will review the work conducted on the Canadian project to understand the technical basis, and consider what adaptations would be needed for U.S. design and construction practice.  The PMC will also review work from other relevant projects including: FEMA P-807Seismic Evaluation and Retrofit of Weak-Story Wood-Frame Buildings, FEMA P-440A Effects of Strength and Stiffness Degradation on Seismic Response (ATC-62 Project), NIST GCR 10-917-9 Applicability of Nonlinear Multiple-Degree-of-Freedom Modeling for Design (ATC 76-6 Project), Static Pushover to Incremental Dynamic Analysis, SPO2IDA, as developed by Vamvatsikos and Cornell (2006).  Work will include the following milestones:

• Initial review of Canadian Methodology (February 8, 2012)
• Identify potential scope of consideration for U.S. practice based on the issues listed below (April 30, 2012)
  • Performance level/definition
  • Definition of low rise
  • Construction types (prototypes)
  • Damage patterns
  • Earthquake sources/regions of seismicity
  • Behavioral limitations/acceptable modes of behavior
  • New buildings with an eye toward existing buildings
  • Analytical engine
  • Modeling sophistication
  • Gravity system drift capacities
  • Torsional considerations
  • Case study analyses as required for validation of scope
• Focused review of Canadian Methodology (June 15, 2012) relative to the above (bulleted) task breakdown
  • Develop ideas for U.S. methodology
  • Review Canadian methodology for solutions
• Summarize the Canadian Methodology (June 30, 2012)
  • Identify what is applicable to U.S. practice
  • Identify necessary adaptations for U.S. practice

Subtask 1.2 – Develop Initial Methodology for Validation Studies

Based on available information, the Project Management Committee will develop an initial methodology targeted to U.S. applications and perform limited proof-of-concept studies.  In developing the initial methodology, the PMC will consider: (1) selected lateral systems that are popularly used in U.S. construction; (2) defined seismic environments and appropriate earthquake ground motion records for intended nonlinear responses analysis and performance measurement; and (3) necessary restrictions on building configuration (e.g. number of stories, height, vertical/ horizontal irregularities). 

At this time, it is envisioned that the U.S. methodology will be closely patterned after the Canadian Methodology.  It is assumed that prior design and analytical work conducted on the Canadian project will be leveraged to conduct proof-of-concept studies.  The scope and extent of studies that can be performed will depend on the degree of similarity or difference between the U.S. methodology and the Canadian Methodology and the resulting variations in construction types, seismicity, and building configurations covered.  Workwill include the following milestones:

• Confirm scope of low-rise applications in U.S. (May 31, 2012)
• Perform limited investigation of technical adaptations (July 15, 2012)
  • Choose one prototype (e.g. wood); attempt solution; identify issues
  • Investigate multistory wood systems; explore modes of behavior including structural and nonstructural elements
  • Check a FEMA P-807 building using the Canadian Analyzer
• Refine list of necessary adaptations for U.S. practice (July 31, 2012)

Task 2: Prepare Draft Outline of the Methodology.  This task involves the preparation of an early draft (20% complete) report outlining the initial methodology, including a summary of the Canadian methodology, adaptations necessary for U.S. construction practice, and recommendations for study in future phases of work.  The report will be prepared under the direction of the Project Technical Director, with assistance from selected members of the PMC.  Workwill include the following milestones:

• Development of a preliminary Outline (June 30, 2012)
• Develop future plan (scope/level of effort/schedule) for adaptation of the Canadian Methodology to develop a FEMA methodology for low-rise buildings in the U.S. (August 15, 2012)
  • Compare with current US practice (IEBC, ASCE 41)
  • Consider implementation ideas (incentives/liability/training)
  • Consider verification
• Submissionof draft report to FEMA (September 14, 2012)