<p>The Shire of York is partnering with the WA Department of Fire and Emergency Services (DFES), the University of Adelaide and Geoscience Australia in a collaborative project that will examine the opportunities for reducing the vulnerability of the township of York to a major earthquake. The project forms part of the Bushfire and Natural Hazards Collaborative Research Centre project “Cost-effective Mitigation Strategy Development for Building related Earthquake Risk”. The township of York has a number of valuable historical buildings that contribute greatly to the town’s economic prosperity and, at the same time, are vulnerable to earthquakes. <p>One of the benefits of retrofitting old buildings is the reduction in physical building repair required following a damaging earthquake. To evaluate this benefit it is necessary to know the vulnerability of the unmitigated building and how this changes following retrofit. This paper describes the approach taken to quantitatively estimate the vulnerability of unmitigated and retrofitted pre-WW1 URM buildings typical of the buildings found in York. Challenges in estimating vulnerability are discussed. Vulnerability curves are presented for one of six generic building types subjected to a range of retrofit scenarios and the economic benefit of each retrofit scenario is discussed.

Knowledge of the nature of buildings within business precincts is fundamental to a broad range of decision making processes, including planning, emergency management and the mitigation of the impact of natural hazards. To support these activities, Geoscience Australia has developed a building information system called the National Exposure Information System (NEXIS) which provides information on buildings across Australia. Most of the building level information in NEXIS is statistically derived, but efforts are being made to include more detailed information on the nature of individual buildings, particularly in business districts. This is being achieved in North Sydney through field survey work.

<p>Rare Australian earthquake events can cause extensive damage and present significant logistical challenges for emergency management agencies and local governments. Evidence of this can be seen from recent earthquake events that include the 2010 Kalgoorlie earthquake and the 1989 Newcastle earthquake of 30 years ago. Emergency managers do not experience damaging earthquakes on the same regular basis as storms, floods, and bushfires and therefore don’t always fully understand the consequences they may face. Scenario modelling can provide insights to inform response and recovery by emergency management and recovery agencies as well as demonstrate how these impacts can be moderated by the retrofit of the most vulnerable building types. <p>The Shire of York is partnering with the WA Department of Fire and Emergency Services (DFES), the University of Adelaide and Geoscience Australia in a collaborative project that explores the current earthquake risk in the heritage town of York, Western Australia, and how the risk could be moderated through targeted retrofit. The project forms part of the Bushfire and Natural Hazards Cooperative Research Centre project “Cost-effective Mitigation Strategy Development for Building Related Earthquake Risk”. This paper describes the approach taken and the predicted consequences modelled for a range of credible earthquake scenarios. Significantly, based on the recommendations from a stakeholder workshop in York on the 9th August 2018, it is also assessing how these consequences would be moderated in future decades through two rates of retrofit uptake in the town. This work is informing emergency management planning by DFES and the Shire of York. It is also illustrating the benefits of targeted community level retrofit to address the risk posed by the community building types most vulnerable to earthquakes.

Knowledge of the nature of buildings within business precincts is fundamental to a broad range of decision making processes, including planning, emergency management and the mitigation of the impact of natural hazards. To support these activities, Geoscience Australia has developed a building information system called the National Exposure Information System (NEXIS) which provides information on buildings across Australia. Most of the building level information in NEXIS is statistically derived, but efforts are being made to include more detailed information on the nature of individual buildings, particularly in business districts. This is being achieved in Adelaide through field survey work.

In Australia there is a lack of retrospective building regulation to address earthquake prone buildings within communities. The commitment of funds to retrofit high risk buildings either by property owners for by government requires decisions to commit constrained resources for this purpose. Engineers are able to communicate the physical solutions to address these buildings but may be less able to articulate the risk reduction proposition to property owners who may reside or operate a business in the building. Further, emergency managers and government policy makers may not understand the broader issues and benefits of targeted intervention. This paper focusses on unreinforced masonry and describes a program of work that has translated earthquake hazard and engineering vulnerability into a range of communication products. Learnings from the application of masonry mitigation research in two case study communities are presented along with their translation into a range of communication products tailored to a range of decision makers and users. The range of benefits considered are broader than damage avoidance, extending to emergency management logistics, economic activity and avoiding losing heritage value in communities. It also describes forward initiatives to integrate earthquake retrofit into broader resilience building interventions that address other natural hazard deficiencies. Abstract submitted to/presented at the 2022 Australian Earthquake Engineering Society (AEES) Conference (https://aees.org.au/aees-conference-2022/).

Knowledge of the nature of buildings within CBD areas is fundamental to a broad range of decision making processes, including planning, emergency management and the mitigation of the impact of natural hazards. To support these activities, Geoscience Australia has developed a building information system called the National Exposure Information System (NEXIS) which provides information on buildings across Australia. Most of the building level information in NEXIS is statistically derived, but efforts are being made to include more detailed information on the nature of individual buildings, particularly in CBD areas. This is being achieved in Brisbane through field survey work.

Knowledge of the nature of buildings within CBD areas is fundamental to a broad range of decision making processes, including planning, emergency management and the mitigation of the impact of natural hazards. To support these activities, Geoscience Australia has developed a building information system called the National Exposure Information System (NEXIS) which provides information on buildings across Australia. Most of the building level information in NEXIS is statistically derived, but efforts are being made to include more detailed information on the nature of individual buildings, particularly in CBD areas. This is being achieved in the Gold Coast through field survey work.

<div>We performed an earthquake risk assessment of seven smaller communities across the Yilgarn of Western Australia (WA): Northam, Merredin, Cunderdin, Kellerberrin, Wundowie, Meckering, and Tammin. This was done as a part of activities of a project entitled “Risk Assessment and Mitigation Study for Earthquakes in the Yilgarn” which, in addition to assessing risk posed to buildings by earthquakes, has a focus on understanding critical infrastructure system risk in the Yilgarn region. We modelled earthquake hazard based on the 2018 National Seismic Hazard Assessment and Geoscience Australia’s seismic site conditions map for Australia. Building exposure data was compiled by a desktop survey using available aerial imagery, purpose captured GoPro streetview type imagery and publicly available real estate information to record building attributes. We used Geoscience Australia’s current vulnerability functions which include a range of models collaboratively developed for high-risk unreinforced masonry buildings. The estimated average annualised loss ratios for the communities range from 0.008% to 0.027%, with the highest being for Kellerberrin, and the lowest being for Wundowie. We combined the damage related risk with the Australian Disaster Resilience Index to identify communities of high risk and lower resilience. Six earthquake scenario events were modelled along with the risk and impact reductions achieved through a virtual retrofit of old URM buildings in the communities. In this paper the outcomes of this research are presented and discussed in a national context.&nbsp;</div> Presented at the 2023 Australian Earthquake Engineering Society (AEES) National Conference

<div>South East Queensland (SEQ) is exposed to a range of severe storms that generate damaging winds, including east coast lows, thunderstorms and tropical cyclones. The risk posed by these storms is not well understood and, in a region that hosts a large proportion of Queensland’s population and economic activity, it is important to understand these risks and the potential benefits of mitigation actions, particularly in the context of climate change, urban planning and the socio-economic status of the population. &nbsp;</div><div>The primary objectives of the Severe Wind Hazard Assessment for South East Queensland (SWHA-SEQ) project (October 2020 – December 2022) were to improve the understanding of current wind risk in SEQ and to develop actionable information to inform future strategies to reduce this risk. Collaboration across fifteen partners in local government, insurance, emergency management, State government and academia has delivered valuable and actionable insights into the risk and resilience of SEQ at a local scale. </div><div> We discuss the relative contributions of different wind storms to the hazard profile, local influences on hazard and risk, and the intersection with community resilience indicators that assist in formulating targeted mitigation strategies. SEQ has a range of landscapes that influence the local hazard, including heavily urbanized lands, semi-rural communities in complex terrain and beachfront or canal estates. These landscapes, and the attributes of the buildings in them, contribute to the risk profile in varied and complex ways. We also explore the intersection of high-risk areas with socio-economic status to identify priority areas for potential retrofit programs. Presented at the 30th Conference of the Australian Meteorological and Oceanographic Society (AMOS) 2024

Knowledge of the nature of buildings within business precincts is fundamental to a broad range of decision making processes, including planning, emergency management and the mitigation of the impact of natural hazards. To support these activities, Geoscience Australia has developed a building information system called the National Exposure Information System (NEXIS) which provides information on buildings across Australia. Most of the building level information in NEXIS is statistically derived, but efforts are being made to include more detailed information on the nature of individual buildings, particularly in business districts. This is being achieved in Sydney through field survey work.