Seismic assessment of residential structures using FEMA P-154 guideline and investigating changes in comparison to FEMA 2002 (case study: Ferdows Blvd of Tehran city)

Background: Residential buildings are highly vulnerable to earthquakes and their destruction can cause many casualties and injuries. Hence, seismic assessment of buildings is necessary prior to earthquake which one of the methods is Rapid-Visual-Screening (RVS).  Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) in its most recent guideline has presented some changes in the data collection form with a conservative approach for seismic assessment of buildings. Method: In this applied research, changes made in the data collection form of RVS, were identified and compared to the previous version. Using this form, seismic assessment of residential buildings of Ferdows neighborhood in 5th region of Tehran city was performed. Findings: In the new version of FEMA, the data collection form for seismicity region is classified into five categories. Some factors such as building type, severe and moderate vertical irregularities, plan irregularity, built year, and soil type have been used to determine the final score. Among 816 selected buildings, 557 newly built buildings have achieved acceptable score and some of them got less than cut-off score. All 259 steel (URM) buildings in this neighborhood are vulnerable to earthquake. Conclusion: The results of this research showed that many newly built buildings should be further evaluated by a design professional experienced in seismic design in order to determine whether they are seismically hazardous.  Reconstruction or strengthening of steel (URM) buildings is necessary as soon as possible.

Keywords:

residential buildings , earthquake , vulnerability , RVS , FEMA P-154 guideline , Tehran city , سازه‌های مسکونی , زلزله , آسیب‌پذیری , ارزیابی بصری سریع , دستورالعمل 2015 فما , شهر تهران