Prato municipality

Study on seismic risk of the Prato municipality area started in 2000 thanks to Tuscan Geophysics Institute and ended in 2008. The work, on request of Comune of Prato - Civil Prtotection Service, was held in three separate phases:
PHASE I: Macroseismic setting (2001)
A lot of data were collected with the aim of defining municipal territory's seismic hazard:

Geo-structural and seismo-tectonic data were used for characterization of seismogenetic areas and structures close to the examined area.
Mitigation laws that governing transfer of seismic energy from source to the investigated site have been applied.
Scenarios of seismic events with potential resentment in Prato were identified by using seismic catalog.
Explanatory data of historical seismicity of Prato's area were collected.

 
 
 
PHASE II: Valutation of site effects (2004)
Study of seismic stress modifications suffered as a result of geological and geomorphological local conditions has been addressed through the use of two different synergistic approaches: the seismometric ones, based on detection and analysis of microtremor, that allowed the investigation of the entire municipal territory through 42 punctual measures, and the geotechnical ones, applied to a specific section of the territory, that permitted to evaluate in detail seismic behaviour of geologically and geomophologically significant areas. Part of the study was conducted in association with the Department of Civil Engineering of Florence University and led to the production of three dissertations of Environment and Territory Engineering Course

 

PHASE III: Analysis of buildings' vulnerability (2008)
Evaluation of buildings consistency diffuse in the municipal territory and estimation of its propensity to be damaged was conducted both in terms of risks analysis (probabilistic approach) and scenario analysis (deterministic approach). Evaluation of seismic risk exposure of population and ordinary buildings was conducted on census level for the entire municipal area and on each building just for particular choosen section. Analysis results are expressed in terms of expected physical damage on buildings, consequences for population and buildings and predictable economic losses. It was also provided a cost-benefit analysis for the evaluation of retrofit intervention strategies to spatial scale and of fundamental frequency of vibration of each building by microtremor measures analysis.