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The LA Times reports that Ls Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti has proposed the most ambitious seismic safety regulations in California history that would require owners to retrofit thousands of buildings most at risk of collapse during a major earthquake. "The time for retrofit is now," says Garcetti, adding that the retrofits target buildings “that are known killers. Complacency risks lives. One thing we can’t afford to do is wait.” The mayor’s plan calls for thousands of wood buildings to be retrofitted within five years, and hundreds of concrete buildings to be strengthened within 30. The retrofitting requirements must be approved by the City Council, and would have to be paid for by the building owners, with the costs presumably passed on to tenants and renters. The costs could be significant: $5,000 per unit in vulnerable wooden buildings and $15 per square foot for office buildings, Business owners, who have expressed concern in the past that these kinds of programs may be unaffordable, said the cost of retrofitting some buildings could easily exceed $1 million each. “This will cost us billions of dollars in the private and public sector,” says Garcetti. “But we cannot afford not to do it.”
The last major earthquake in Los Angeles was the 6.7-magnitude Northridge quake, which killed close to 60 people in 1994. But it was not close to the catastrophe that seismologists predict if there is a major shift on the San Andreas fault, and the fact that it has not produced a major quake in recent years has fed a sense of complacency. Seismologists now say a 7.5-magnitude event on the Puente Hills would be "the quake from hell" because it runs right under downtown Los Angeles and have estimated that would kill up to 18,000 people, make several million homeless, and cause up to $250 billion in damage. “We want to keep the city up and running after the earthquake happens,” says Lucy Jones aka "The Earthquake Lady," a seismologist with the United States Geological Survey and something of a celebrity in a city that is very aware of the potential danger of its location. “If everything in this report is enacted, I believe that L.A. will not just survive the next earthquake, but will be able to recover quickly.”
(Score: 1, Troll) by cmn32480 on Thursday December 11 2014, @12:38PM
That LA will just fall into the ocean and my property in Arizona will become beach front.
An earthquake that size leaving several million homeless would be a major humanitarian crisis. We should start evacuating LA now. Maybe we can save some of the people from the screwiness that is southern California.
Keeping the city running is a pipe dream. You thought Katrina was bad? Wait 'till FEMA has to deal with something of this size.
"It's a dog eat dog world, and I'm wearing Milkbone underwear" - Norm Peterson
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 11 2014, @12:51PM
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 12 2014, @12:01AM
The Pacific Plate and the North American Plate form a series of slip-strike faults.
Western California is migrating toward Alaska--not toward the bottom of the ocean.
...and after 90210 has become 99501-adjacent, there will still be a lot of California between Arizona and the Pacific.
-- gewg_
(Score: 2) by cmn32480 on Friday December 12 2014, @01:26PM
Thanks for being a buzzkill _gewg.
"It's a dog eat dog world, and I'm wearing Milkbone underwear" - Norm Peterson
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 12 2014, @09:13PM
Let's see if I can make up for that.
metrolyrics.com/ocean-front-property-lyrics-george-strait.html [metrolyrics.com]
-KLVwRrCR3g [youtube.com]
-- gewg_