Database of tall pre-Northridge steel moment frames for earthquake performance evaluations

Abstract

This article describes a detailed database of tall steel moment frame buildings that are representative of the construction practices in San Francisco prior to the 1994 Northridge earthquake. The database contains design details that affect the structural performance of steel moment frames, including frame geometry, member cross-section sizes, and gravity system characteristics. This database also captures irregularities that might impact seismic response, such as podiums, setbacks, mass concentrations (mechanical, electrical, and plumbing (MEP) floors), interrupted column lines, and atriums. The database includes information on 89 moment frame buildings, 14 of which were built before 1960 and are constructed with riveted connections, while the remaining 75 have welded flange connections like those that suffered brittle fracture during the 1994 Northridge earthquake. The buildings are further distinguished between space frame, perimeter frame, and partial space frame systems. For about half (41/89) of the buildings in the database, section sizes of representative structural members were collected, which enabled the evaluation of the seismic design, elastic, and inelastic response using computational workflows. The design diagnostics indicate that most of the buildings meet the minimum seismic strength and strong-column weak-beam requirements of modern building codes, even though they were not necessarily designed with this intent. On the contrary, about one-third of the buildings do not meet the seismic design drift limit of current codes, and about half of them have weak beam-column panel zones. This database, associated structural analysis models, and processing scripts are published at DesignSafe https://doi.org/10.17603/ds2-wjad-r340 to facilitate collaboration and continued development of open-source data for high-resolution simulations to inform risk mitigation strategies on a regional scale.