Seismic Analysis of Historic Masonry Buildings: The Vicarious Palace in Pescia (Italy)

Abstract

Recent Italian earthquakes have underlined the need for wide monitoring and safety assessment of architectonical heritage. This has emerged also from requirements of the new Italian Technical Recommendations for buildings. Within this subject the paper investigates the seismic vulnerability of a specific monumental masonry building: the Vicarious Palace (Palazzo del Vicario) in Pescia, a small town near Florence. The structural behavior of the Palace was investigated using a finite element model in which the non-linearities of the masonry were considered by proper constitutive assumptions. The seismic behavior was evaluated by the pushover method, according to the Italian Technical Recommendations. The results were compared with the ones obtained by a simplified approach based on the kinematic theorem of limit analysis. Comparisons of the expected seismic demand vs the seismic capacity of the Palace confirm the weakness of this type of building to suffer extensive damage under earthquakes, as frequently observed in similar construction typologies. Additionally, the comprehension of the structural behavior under seismic loading allows the identification of a proper retrofitting strategy.

Seismic Analysis of Old Masonry Buildings using Equivalent Static Method

“…[8] This paper aimed on the provisions that apart from the recent methods which are well acknowledged in the codes of practice, there are some other old traditional earthquake resistant methods which have verified to be in effect for resisting earthquake loading and are also cost effective with easy constructability and various recommendations for earthquake resistant structures are provided in it also. 9) Michele Betti and Luciano Galano 2012 [9] The paper investigated the seismic susceptibility of a specific monumental masonry structure. The structural behaviour of the Palace was examined using a finite element model in which the non-linearity of the masonry was considered by proper constitutive assumptions.…”

Seismic vulnerability study of Soltaniyeh dome using nonlinear static and dynamic analyses

“…During the reconstruction of the building in the 1960s, three reinforced concrete rings in the level of the dome's support were constructed to reduce the radial outward forces in the button of the dome, which leads to the significant beneficial effect on the dome's behavior under the gravity load. Funiciello et al (1995) Roman Colosseum Güler and Celep (2003) Hagia Sophia Alper (2004) Hagia Sophia Miltiadou-Fezans 2008Dafini Catholic temple Static, nonlinear Sinopoli and Di Pasquale (2007) Colosseum Anzani et al (2010) (Theoretic approach) Dynamic, nonlinear Betti and Vignoli (2008) Italian Romanesque church Betti and Vignoli (2011) Santa Maria church Betti and Galano (2012) Vicarious palace, Masonry building San Francesco church (Italy) Clementi et al 2016Ferraro et al 2016Historic center(City of L' Aquila) (Italy) Hacıefendioğlu and Koç 2016Historic masonry bridges Clementi et al (2016) Strategic building in catania (Italy)…”

Time-History Seismic Analysis of Masonry Buildings: A Comparison between Two Non-Linear Modelling Approaches

“…At the same time, they showed that the use of three-dimensional finite element (FE) models requires a great amount of computational resources, which may be justified only in the case of historical and/or monumental buildings [9][10][11]. Analyzing traditional buildings, the need emerges for simplified, but effective (and reliable) models for the assessment of the global structural response through non-linear time-history analysis methods.…”