Reconstruction process of damaged residential buildings outside historical centres after the L’Aquila earthquake: part II—“heavy damage” reconstruction

The reconstruction process of residential buildings severely damaged by the 06 April 2009 L’Aquila earthquake, the so called “heavy damage” reconstruction, started after the “light damage” reconstruction process. The “heavy damage” reconstruction involved buildings outside the historical centres assessed as unusable due to high structural and/or non-structural risk. The costs of repair and strengthening of both the “light damage” and the “heavy damage” were directly funded by the State. The procedures to deal with funding applications made by private owners were similar to those related to the “light damage” reconstruction, but specific regulations were issued to regulate the public contributions of severely damaged buildings in L’Aquila and other municipalities. The paper describes such regulations and the data collected during the approval process of funding applications. In particular, the discussion focuses on: the time for the approval of funding applications; the types and costs of the different repair and strengthening interventions designed by practitioners to attain the usability recovery of buildings; the State funding for repair works, strengthening works, tests on material for their mechanical characterization, energy efficiency upgrading, and, in several cases, for demolition and reconstruction; the correlation between structural types of buildings and costs. The process of assessment and State funding of repairs and upgrading of residential buildings outside historical centres that were damaged by the L’Aquila earthquake took less time than past Italian earthquakes with similar or even lower impacts. The data presented may help, inform and encourage decision makers to establish priorities and reconstruction policies for use in the aftermath of future earthquakes. Being prepared for destructive earthquake impacts requires identification of the procedures and tools required to quickly start the reconstruction phase.