Sep 30, 2013
The City of San Francisco took a big step in addressing the danger posed by the poor earthquake performance of "soft-story" buildings by approving a landmark ordinance earlier this year requiring seismic evaluation and retrofit of approximately 3,000 buildings as early as 2017.
The legislation would affect some of the most susceptible structures to damage because soft-story buildings – those with parking or commercial space on the ground floor and residential units on higher floors – can collapse with particularly disastrous consequences.
The city has sent notices to the owner of each wood-framed, multi-floor residential building permitted prior to 1978, to begin the process of complying with the ordinance within a "tiered compliance" timeline of 2017-2020, depending on the use of the building and the liquefaction susceptibility of the property. According to the city, the construction cost for each building is estimated to be between $60,000 and $130,000. Failure to comply will result in violation notices posted on the property and recorded against the title of the building.
Clearly, this is an no-nonsense piece of legislation with serious costs and consequences to building owners.
Marx|Okubo can help you minimize the impacts of this new legislation with our California-licensed Structural Engineering Group to:
- Determine whether your building is subject to the ordinance
- Conduct a seismic risk assessment to evaluate the physical condition of your building's structural system
- Design any modifications that may be needed, and subsequently manage the construction
For additional information from the San Francisco city website, click here.
