Title: A risk-based system for managing the retrofitting of school buildings in seismic prone areas: a case study from Iran

Authors: Kamran Vahdat; Nigel J. Smith

Addresses: Institute for Resilient Infrastructure, School of Civil Engineering, University of Leeds, Woodhouse Lane, Leeds, LS1 9JT, UK ' Institute for Resilient Infrastructure, School of Civil Engineering, University of Leeds, Woodhouse Lane, Leeds, LS1 9JT, UK

Abstract: Earthquake events are inevitable but the consequences of earthquake disasters are partially controllable using an effective risk management system. A systematic risk-based method is proposed for assessing the resilience capacities of school buildings exposed to varying levels of seismic risk. This approach screens and monitors the equivalent seismic performance of buildings by the means of new composite risk index (FSRi). The results reveal that the FSRi does not necessarily follow its factors' trends. Therefore seismic mitigation decisions should be made in compliance with the multi dimensional aspects of seismic risk as an aggregated index such as FSRi.

Keywords: seismic risk management; fuzzy logic; uncertainty; vulnerability; risk-based systems; retrofitting buildings; school buildings; earthquakes; case study; Iran; resilience capacity; aggregated index.

DOI: 10.1504/IJRAM.2014.062786

International Journal of Risk Assessment and Management, 2014 Vol.17 No.4, pp.311 - 331

Received: 30 Oct 2012
Accepted: 03 Sep 2013
Published online: 24 Oct 2014 *

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