Influence of Seismic Behavior Factor on the Design of Building Structures for Low Seismic Demands Regions

Abstract

The use of reduced seismic forces obtained from elastic response spectra analysis is a common practice for structural design purposes. This procedure is used: (a) To take advantage of the nonlinear behavior of the structural elements that conform the entire structure, and (b) To reduce the initial cost of the construction, allowing certain degree of damage if a severe earthquake occurs, but trying to avoid collapse with good structural design and construction detailing. In this paper, structural analyses were performed using several seismic reduction coefficients and the considered structures were designed for low seismic design regions according to the Mexico construction codes for both, serviceability limit states and ultimate limit states. Results show that the final design is strongly dependent on allowed interstory drift, associated to lateral displacements. Results also showed that, reducing significantly the seismic forces is not directly associated with a reduction in the initial cost of the structure, i.e., the final design for different seismic behavior factor may have similar seismic vulnerability.