A PROPOSAL FOR SEISMIC CAPACITY EVALUATION OF EXISTING BUILDING FOUNDATIONS

Abstract

During the 1995 Hyogoken-Nanbu earthquake numerous cases were observed where buildings were structurally or functionally damaged due to the suffering of the foundations. The seismic safety of a building should be comprehensively judged considering not only the superstructure but also the foundation. There is an authorized standard for seismic capacity evaluation of superstructures, whereas not for the foundations. In the paper we propose a method of seismic capacity evaluation of existing building foundations considering their ultimate strength, failure modes and ductility.