Retrofitted For Earthquakes
If you live in Los Angeles, chances are you’ve seen seismic retrofitting work being done to a building. I saw enough of them myself that I got curious about these projects — and as a data reporter, I am always looking for new datasets to explore.
A retrofit strengthens vulnerable buildings to better withstand shaking from earthquakes, making them less likely to collapse or suffer damage. But my colleagues and I found that at least 6,000 structures in the Los Angeles area are not retrofitted.
Los Angeles Times
The Westside of Los Angeles, which is more affluent and has larger populations of white residents, has more completed retrofits and individual cities with ordinances requiring them. Areas with larger populations of people of color and lower-income residents, such as South Los Angeles, are less likely to see completed retrofits.
Neighboring cities in the area, such as Inglewood and Compton, don’t have retrofit ordinances on the books — so we don’t know how their retrofitting efforts look.
Lead the way in seismic retrofits
Getting this data together was not an easy task. The county doesn’t have requirements that cities within it must adhere to, leaving them to decide whether to pass an ordinance and what types of buildings to include.
To assess properties, city officials survey building plans and Google Maps before deciding what type of rules to put in place. Many cities that have begun retrofitting programs started with soft-story buildings. I worked with each city to gather information on the retrofit status of buildings in the area. Some of the cities didn’t have the data compiled until we requested it.
Legal Requirements
California law requires earthquake retrofitting of certain buildings:
- Review Link
- Ordinance 184081 (Insert our highlighted copy)
- Ordinance 183893 (Insert our highlighted copy)
- Earthquake Damage Examples
- Earthquake Engineering
- Seismic vulnerabilities
- Chart
- Reference guide
