Portfolio: Project Details
Napa Post Offices - 3 Locations
Post-Earthquake Structural Review & Repair
Napa, CA
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At the request of the United States
Post Office, Interactive Resources performed a visual post-earthquake
structural review of several U.S. Postal Service buildings in the city of Napa,
California. The site visits were performed on September 5 and 6, 2000 to
determine if the damage resulting from the Yountville Earthquake of September
3, 2000 could pose a danger to occupants of the building, and to make
recommendations to substantially restore the building to pre-earthquake
capacity.
Building construction varies among the three post office locations. The
Franklin Branch is a two-story building with masonry exterior walls
approximately 30 feet high and a roof supported by steel trusses. Inside,
wall finishes are a combination of plaster and clay tile. The Main Branch is a
single story building with concrete walls at the exterior, a flexible plywood
diaphragm and free-standing interior columns. Lastly, the Wine Valley Box
Unit consists of single-story exterior concrete walls and wood truss roof
framing with wood plank sheathing.
Interactive Resources found that the primary structural systems of the three
buildings were largely undamaged. In order to provide lateral strength
equal to that prior to the earthquake, Interactive Resources recommended that
repairs be made to cracked tiles, masonry, plaster and stone wall finishes, as
well as mechanical and electrical equipment anchorage and bracing. We
concluded that Post Office occupancy could be continued without substantial
additional risk to the occupants. We later designed repairs based on our
recommendations.
