Menu
Soft-Story retrofitting applies to properties, residential, commercial and apartment buildings that have a habitable room or rooms above a garage, carport or porch area that were not specifically designed to transmit shear or lateral forces to the story above.
A soft-story seismic retrofit involves:
A soft-story condition exists when a building, typically an apartment complex, has openings in the first floor perimeter walls, such as tuck-under parking, subterranean parking or an open storefront. Under these conditions, the first floor is unable to support the weight of the floors above during an earthquake.
The Soft-Story building is a structure which has a weaker first floor and is unable to carry the weight of the stories above during an earthquake. The first floor generally would have large openings in the perimeter walls such as garages, tuck under parking or even large windows.
These illustrations provide a basic view of a typical soft story and how installing moment frames prevent the lateral motion caused by a seismic event.
Contact us to request an assessment.
Next, reach out to fellow building owners who have had a seismic retrofit and see if they can refer you to at least one company who specializes in soft-story seismic work. If that’s not an option, reach out to a few retrofitting companies and get a free consultation, which they should offer if they’re at all reputable.
Beware, we’ve watched the market flood with fly-by-night companies offering seismic retrofitting services. The most recent one we encountered was from a plumbing company deciding to get in on the action. Do your research and ask for at least one referral by whichever company you are considering and look to see that they have successfully completed at least a few soft-story retrofits.
The City of Los Angeles recently passed Ordinance 183893, which requires the retrofit of pre-1978 wood-frame Soft-Story buildings and non-ductile concrete buildings. The goal of the mandatory retrofit programs, under the ordinance, is to reduce these structural deficiencies and improve the performance of these buildings during earthquakes. Without proper strengthening, these vulnerable buildings may be subjected to structural failure during and/or after an earthquake.
From past earthquakes, multi-story buildings with weak and/or open front wall lines creating a “soft-story” (i.e. buildings with tuck-under-parking) performed poorly and collapsed. The goal of the mandatory retrofit program, under Ordinance 183893 and Ordinance 184081, is to reduce structural deficiencies by the most economical and feasible method. Without proper strengthening, these vulnerable buildings may be subjected to structural failure during and/or after an earthquake.
Buildings that are most vulnerable have been identified with the following criteria:
Each property owner of these buildings will be sent an order to comply. These orders will be sent accordingly based on the following priorities:
| Priority | Categories | Start date of Sending Out Orders |
|---|---|---|
| I. Buildings with 16 or more dwelling units | 3-story and above | May 2, 2016 |
| 2-story | July 22, 2016 | |
| II. Buildings with 3 or more stories | with less than 16 units | Oct 17, 2016 |
| III. Buildings not falling within the definition of Priority I or II | with 9-15 units | TBD |
| with 7-8 units | TBD | |
| with 4-6 units | TBD | |
| Condos/Commercial | TBD |
The property owner must comply with the ordinance within the following time limits:
From the receipt of the Order to Comply:
The time it takes to repair a soft story all depends on how much work needs to be done. Each job is unique, as some may take only a few weeks to complete, while others may take three-four months, depending upon the scope of the work.
Each project will vary depending on the scope(size and scale). A small 5-7 unit apartment requiring only a single steel moment frame may cost as low as $30,000 – $40,000, while large 40-unit apartments requiring several moment frames and/or cantilevered columns and substantial structural framing reinforcement could be in the hundreds of thousands.
Contact us to request an assessment.
