Reducing the seismic vulnerability of cultural heritage buildings (original) (raw)
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I Congreso Iberoamericano sobre Construcciones Históricas y Estructuras de Mampostería, 2008
The acknowledgment of the scientific community that the structural safety aspects of constructions belonging to the cultural heritage can not be treated according to standard procedures that are fitted for new construc-tions, is leading to new, specific approaches for assessing their actual structural performances and then for developing new, more appropriate methodologies and design criteria for their repair and strengthening. The basic idea is that the usual, even the most sophisticated, structural design approaches naturally imply a certain level of “over-design”, and this can lead to unacceptable solutions when dealing with “existing structures” (ISO 13822). Over-designing interventions on existing structures could in fact imply in general unacceptable costs and, in the case of the historical heritage, unacceptable losses of cultural (historic, artistic) values. On this respect, the “seismic condition” presents the most delicate implications, as the very extreme resources of the structure , i.e. those connected with resistance mechanisms that are normally neglected and in any case almost impossible to include in structural models, are mobilized. Attempts to offer comprehensive method-ologies to tackle such difficulties have been recently made at an international level by the ISCARSAH com-mittee of ICOMOS and, for constructions in seismic areas, by the Italian standardisation bodies (Ministry of Culture and Ministry of Public Works). The consciousness that any calculation imply over-design has as rele-vant consequence that the formal match between “code requirements” and “formally demonstrated structural performances” can be misleading, and not necessarily required. Assessment is no more considered a more or less sophisticated exercise of analytical/numerical structural models, but an articulated and combined use of structural models, historical informations, surveys and investigations, personal, qualitative judgments (based on past experiences, specific training, comparisons, evaluations of past performances of a constructions) that in a “multidisciplinary” context , ensuring that all the values (economical, social, historic, artistic) of the con-structions are taken into account, leads to a final decisions on if and how to intervene. Moreover, safeguarding “cultural values” implies also appropriated selection and design of the intervention materials and technolo-gies. Attention is than paid to the possibilities offered by the traditional solutions and to their possible combi-nations with innovative ones. The general aspects of the Italian approach that have been outlined, together with some case studies are pre-sented to exemplify these guiding principles and to introduce researches on traditional and innovative tech-niques and methodologies, employed in historical structures, carried out at the University of Padua.
Seismic Protection of Cultural Heritage
Restoration of Ayışığı Monastery Chapel, 2011
The Restoration Project of Ayışığı Monastery is a case study of restoration for adaptive future reuse of a historic structure. In this paper, aside from the architectural, cultural, and historic significance of the structure, challenges of restoration design and the execution of the design will be discussed. The focus of the paper will be the Chapel structure restoration since this was the only restorable structure on the Monastery site. The other structures were un-repairable and they were reconstructed. Reinforcements and re-constructions against possible seismic events as well as gravity loading on the structure will be depicted. The existing condition of the structures was investigated as of the end of 2008, and drawings and reports of the architectural, structural, and material-wise condition of the structure were documented at the beginning of 2009. Subsequently, re-construction (restitüsyon) drawings were made. In May 2009 restoration design was completed. After it was approved by the authorities, construction started toward the end of the same year.
Seismic vulnerability of building heritage of the University of Bologna: methodology and analysis
2016
Due to the recent code developments and of the growing attention given to the seismic safety of structures, especially after the last Italian earthquakes, the analysis and verification of existing building heritage have become a fundamental tool to assess the seismic vulnerability, to safeguard human lives and to plan structural interventions. The Italian building heritage is characterized by high complexity and heterogeneity, both from architectural and structural points of view. It consists in structures built in various ages, placed both in the city center and in the outskirts, erected by different structural techniques and with different uses. For all these reasons, it is important to define a methodology to obtain comparable results to plan the future activities of risk analysis, assessment and management. Before providing a result about the level of safety of an existing building, it is essential to acquire the right knowledge and to choose a method of analysis that can captur...
Editorial-Special Issue on Structural Rehabilitation of Historic Buildings-IJMSI
International Journal of Materials and Structural Integrity, 2011
Biographical notes: Oguz C. Celik's research focuses on the seismic evaluation, design, and retrofit of existing buildings and bridges, including historic timber and masonry structures. His work addresses the protection of such structures under extreme events, e.g., earthquakes, using seismic energy dissipation systems and advanced composite materials. He is a member of several national and international committees. He has been involved in many real-life seismic rehabilitation and retrofit projects in Turkey, Europe, and in Asia, including Ottoman Imperial mosques, Roman and Byzantine churches, cisterns, and aqueducts. He has published more than 80 publications in national and international journals, conference proceedings, and books. Significant experimental and theoretical work has been done so far in the field of structural damage detection, evaluation, and rehabilitation of historic buildings. Major earthquakes over the last 20 years in Turkey, Indonesia, Italy, Chile, New Z...
Congresso Patrimonio 2010., 2010
The architectural heritage was seriously affected by the April 6th 2009 earthquake in the Abruzzo region, especially considering the effects on a city with the size and with historical and strategic importance as a capital of a region, such as L’Aquila. The emergency activities that were carried out immediately after the earthquake, to protect the existing Cultural Heritage (C.H.) structures, were conducted on two parallel levels: (i) damage surveys and design and (ii) implementation of temporary safety measures. The overall organization was centralized in the structure “Protection of Cultural Heritage” at Di.Coma.C., managed by the Civil Protection Department. This allowed the cooperation among different involved subjects (Ministry of Cultural Heritage officers, experts on structural engineering from Universities and Fire Brigade teams), with their own specific knowledge. Keystone of the operating process was the standardization of the damage survey and of its immediate and correct interpretation, through dedicated survey forms for churches and palaces, developed by the G.La.Be.C. (Working group for the protection of C.H. from natural risks). The experience in the field of temporary safety measures was extremely interesting: ideas for engineering the process were developed, in cooperation with the work of the fire brigade men, which are highly experienced technicians in the “emergency” field. After the emergency period, it’s necessary to pass to the rehabilitation phase, this process will, among many other activities, also involve the seismic upgrade of the C.H. structures, in order to minimize damage in case other equally devastating earthquakes. As so, some “conservative” intervention criteria, capable of seismically upgrade this type of constructions and ensuring acceptable structural safety conditions, under seismic and static loads, are presented. Special attention was paid to the possibilities offered by the traditional solutions and to their possible combinations with innovative ones. These intervention criteria were developed based on the University of Padua (UNIPD) research experience in similar seismic events, as the observation of the damages resulting from this type of event are essential for: (i) the definition of new interpretative models, adjusted on the effective damage patterns experienced by the structures, and (ii) for the validation (or rejection) of intervention techniques that demonstrated different performances during seismic events; which will aid on the development of new intervention criteria. As the presented intervention criteria will be very useful on the seismic improvement of the C. H. structures in Abruzzo, the 2009 seismic event in this region will certainly provide new and important knowledge in this area, as the number of affected structures, with previous intervention, is very high.
The structural behavior of heritage buildings is now a priority for restoration architects and structural engineers, because of the loss of human lives and the damages in the constructions caused by earthquakes. The conventional intervention, which applies the Colombian code for earthquake-resistant constructions (NSR 10), affects the conservation of their heritage values. This is a proposal for a structural analysis applying traditional methods, but including the integral knowledge of the building, as well as the structural principles that their behavior and the development of intervention proposals based on their own structural principles. A group of doctrinal churches in the high lands of Boyacá and Cundinamarca in Colombia (1579-1616) were selected as cases of study , using a basic architectonical church model, which maintains the constant geometry, but modifies its constructive technique, with the purpose of understanding the differences and result interpretations for this type of constructions. The evidence shows the importance of involving the comprehension of distinctive technical features, as a way to achieve seismic protection solutions for human life, in the same way as historical construction values.
Seismic Safety of Architectural Heritage in India: State-of-the-Art and Future Challenges
Annually, natural disasters cause loss of life, damage to property, and environment concomitant is damage to the cultural heritage property. In the wake disaster occurrence, containment and response efforts put cultural resources at risk due to ignorance from conservation experts, policy makers particularly in developing countries like India as compared to many counties across the globe. Theoretical and conceptual premises indicate that seismic retrofit leading to preservation of historic structures requires the satisfaction of the requirements of aesthetics, architecture, engineering and technology. Protection of cultural heritage from natural hazards and disasters is remained a neglected issue which has not been adequately accommodated in legislation or in national laws, by-laws and other documents worldwide by and large with a few exceptions. The present prevention and emergency measures are focused on saving human lives which result in total failure to protect cultural heritage assets as observed in Bhuj earthquake of 2001 India. The existing databases regarding cultural heritage in the country are fragmented and incomplete, and do not contain authentic data that is essential for natural hazard risk assessment processes and risk management approaches. Research establishes that conventional strengthening methods, especially those involving ‘invisible’ intervention, will continue to play an important part in the seismic protection of historic structures. However, the development of innovative technology for wider application is felt for heritage buildings in India. Using the interpretive approach this paper discusses the technical issues pertaining to the seismic retrofit of historic buildings, and explores various practices which are in current use in India for conservation of historic buildings. Based on past experiences it evaluates the feasibility of traditional as well as innovative technologies considering the character of Indian heritage built stock. Present paper endeavors to put forth the key challenges and achievements in heritage conservation with reference seismic environment in India. Considering the vulnerability of heritage buildings from seismic activity it is aimed to explore the measures required to render them strong enough to sustain damages on earthquake occurrence for posterity.
Guidelines for the safety and preservation of historical centres in seismic areas
2003
The explicit reference to the methodology framed and experimented by Antonino Giuffrè for the historical centres’ analysis and subsequent intervention gives a univocal connotation to this contribute, which explains the procedure of the interventions’ analysis and definition adapting the safety demands to those of the preservation. This procedure arises from a mechanical interpretation of the historical building industry with particular reference to its lacking points as far as the seismic action is concerned and leads to a conscious choice of intervention suitable criteria. Its mainly operative aim lends itself well to the establishment of guidelines that can generally direct the quality of the interventions on the historical centres’ built-up heritage towards a homogeneous trend. 146 Historical Constructions gin, and for which the most appropriate techniques of intervention and, in particular, of seismic improvement have to be located. The philosophy underpinning Giuffrè’s approach...