Seismic Considerations in Architectural Design of Special Buildings

Despite the existence of several publications with regard to so-called “earthquake resistant architecture”, most of these publication deals with general considerations,applicable mainly to ordinary buildings, and only few of them address the case of aforementioned special buildings. Many of these building have specific architectural design depending on their assigned function, which is quite different from ordinary buildings. This paper presents some specific seismic considerations to be regarded in the architectural design of special buildings. Special attention is paid to some of special buildings like terminals, particularly those belonging to airports, which have very great roles in aid-receiving process from other countries or states in the case of a destructive earthquake. This point is much more important in developing countries,which usually need more help in catastrophic events. It is believed that following the recommendations presented in this paper will lead to more reliable seismic behavior of these buildings, and consequently their functionality during and after the earthquake, which is the main concern about these buildings from the “seismic risk mitigation” point of view.

Keywords:

Architectural Seismic Design , Rescue and Relief Centers , Government Important Buildings , Educational Buildings , Terminals , Risk Mitigation