Conclusion

This analysis unveils a prevalent issue of high seismic hazard in North San Fernando. It experienced two large seismic earthquakes in the span of the last 100 years, with a 6.7 in Northridge on January 17, 1994, and a 6.6 earthquake in Sylmar in 1971 on February 9th. In fact, a newly built hospital called Olive View Hospital collapsed while the Veterans Administration Hospital’s wing completely collapsed during the Sylmar Earthquake, according to ABC Eyewitness News (“1971 Sylmar earthquake was a wake-up call for building safety in Los Angeles”). The city made efforts to prevent seismic risk by mandating retrofitting for roughly a thousand buildings in Downtown Los Angeles that have non-ductile concrete (“1971 Sylmar earthquake was a wake-up call for building safety in Los Angeles”). Despite these preventative issues, many residential builds were neglected in this mandate. Unfortunately, roughly 82,000 residential buildings were damaged or destroyed by the Northridge earthquake in 1994, according to Earthquake Country Alliance (“The Northridge Earthquake: January 17, 1994”). This is important because San Fernando has a history of 6-magnitude earthquakes in an area of older residential buildings built in 1920-1960 that aren’t retrofitted, placing an urgency to reduce seismic damage from another severe earthquake in the future. 

The San Fernando Valley is at the highest risk of seismic damage from earthquakes, with its Northern Zip codes having the highest concentration of seismic activity. In particular, the city of Sylmar possesses the highest architectural vulnerability, as roughly 75% of buildings were constructed before 1970 before seismic retrofitting codes were implemented. This is extremely dangerous as buildings are capable of decaying over time, and it’s uncertain how strong the foundations of the buildings are. Further research is needed to map all the buildings that have been retrofitted and are compliant with the current seismic architectural codes.