Simplified Method for the Fragility Analysis of Masonry Buildings at the Territorial Scale

The Italian building stock consists of a large number of masonry buildings with different characteristics and attributes, depending on the period of construction, the materials and the design criteria or construction methods used. In this context, there is the need to assess the seismic vulnerability of existing buildings and develop a methodology for estimating the potential damages caused by seismic events, with the further aim of establishing priorities of interventions and, therefore, of reducing the National seismic risk. The complexity of the problem and the lack of available information at national level imply considerable uncertainties. In the framework of the CARTIS project, funded by the Italian Department for Civil Protection, an investigation of the built heritage of the municipality of Maranello (Italy) is proposed, with the objective to derive typological fragility curves for the residential masonry building stock. Firstly, the municipal territory has been divided into homogenous areas, called Sectors, mainly based on the evolution of the area over time. The seismic vulnerability assessment of some structures, representative of the building stock in the investigated area, is carried out using a simplified methodology. The outcomes from the simplified method were combined and response surfaces in relation to significant structural parameters were obtained for all the typologies. Then, using Monte Carlo simulations, fragility curves for the single typologies were derived and combined to obtain overall fragility curves for Sectors.