Rebuilding after an earthquake
Practical Action
The following design principles were applied to all categories of buildings. Local buildings and
proposed designs that did not match these criteria were either modified or rejected in the public
interest:
Structural safety. Technologies should be earthquake-resistant to the extent of meeting all the
structural requirements of seismic zone 4 in the building standards.
Thermal comfort. Internal comfort had to be maintained, especially keeping the temperature
fluctuation to a minimum during the summer months.
Functional efficiency. Buildings should be able to accommodate all the essential functions of
current houses, especially the storage of agricultural implements, a separate sleeping area, an
independent cooking space, and shelter for animals. These needs determined a minimum area
that the basic core unit would occupy. The provision of open, semi-open, and covered spaces
should comply with existing practices, as should the layout and clustering of the buildings.
Cost effectiveness. Given the above three factors, the most cost- effective technical option
should be selected, taking into account the life-cycle cost of the buildings and its durability.
Use of local resources. This is a subsidiary constraint which is currently being promoted as the
most important factor in technology choice.
The bulk of international experience of reconstruction indicates that the average period of
return to permanent dwellings across all documented natural disasters is between one to three
years. Hence, the choice of construction technology on the basis of speed of construction is not
the most important factor. Many other constraints will delay construction, including the
availability of land; sharing and demarcation the plots; infrastructure development; and the
resumption of agricultural and other occupations. Speed of construction is probably not going to
emerge as a critical constraint.
Community participation. This is
an absolutely necessary condition
for the success of all relocation and
reconstruction programmes, as has
been demonstrated in both Indian
and international experience. The
participation of the local
communities in the process of
technology choice, decisions on
methods of construction, building
work, and supervision of works has
proved not only to be successful in
the long term, but also the most
efficient economic option because
of increased mobilization of
community labour and resources.
Relocation
Figure 3: The use of long through-stones in a stone wall will
make the wall more stable. (Illustration from Technical
Principles of Building for Safety by Andrew Cobum, Richard
Hughes, Robin Spence. and Antonois Pomonis. IT Publications,
London, 1995.)
People from affected villages wanted
to relocate as they felt that their present villages were unsafe. In addition, as they had been
forced to cremate or bury the bodies of the earthquake victims in the village itself, they did not
want to build on the same site.
Purely in building terms, the relocation of the extensively damaged villages was desirable
because:
In settlements situated on mounds and deep soil areas, future earthquakes were likely
to cause severe damage.
The cost of removing tonnes of rubble could have been exorbitant, especially as any
future buildings on these sites were likely to use thin stone walls. As most of the
villages were surrounded by good agricultural land, the rubble would have had to have
been dumped at a distance of more than 500m
The cost of building on rocky or hard murram would be much lower, as the foundations
could be less than a metre deep
Drainage systems would be cheaper and sanitation conditions would be much better on
sloping shallow soil sites than on flatter land.
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