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Project Name
Mitigating losses to housing due to extreme natural hazards
Principal Investigator
F.M. Bartlett
Objective
This proposal solicits funding for an intensive one-year research program to lay the groundwork for constructing a test facility capable of subjecting full-scale house "specimens" to loads representative of extreme natural hazards. The short-term (one year) deliverables include a high-profile workshop, co-hosted by ICLR, that will discuss and publicize the concept with leading authorities in the field and with potential stakeholders. Detailed reports exploring various research ideas relevant to the test house concept will provide information of immediate relevance to ICLR's objectives, including a comprehensive review of existing wind load data for low-rise buildings and new data specific to the proposed test house. The workshop, envisaged for February 2003, would involve researchers from other institutions currently working in these areas, representatives of the construction and insurance industries, and officials from government agencies. A favourable response from these potential stakeholders would trigger preparation of a major grant application to CFI for the basic infrastructure and a request to ICLR for seed resources necessary to realize the test facility. This long-term objective, a "Home for Investigating and Reducing Natural Hazard Damage to Housing", would (1) generate media interest to enhance societal awareness of natural hazard damage potential, (2) be an effective aid to develop remedial construction alternatives and demonstrate the importance of construction quality to builders and contractors, (3) provide new information on the reliability of current code approaches to housing, both from the viewpoint of adequacy and economy, (4) test the effectiveness of component testing and analytical approaches to the prediction of the overall performance of the house system, (5) provide a national focus for research on a variety of other issues related to house construction, (6) provide a superb educational training ground for graduate students and construction industry workers, and (7) be an effective emblem of ICLR's contribution to this area.
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