Performance assessment of tall concrete core‐wall building designed using two alternative approaches

SUMMARY Concrete core-wall structural systems are prevalent for high-rise residential buildings in the West Coast of the United States. To assess the seismic performance characteristics of this system, a 42-story core-wall residential building was designed for a site in Los Angeles, CA. The building was designed using two different design approaches. The first design followed prescriptive requirements of US building codes, except height limits were disregarded. The second design followed a performance-based procedure. Analytical models of each design were subjected to a series of earthquake ground motions representative of very frequent to very rare shaking intensities. Effectiveness of the various design methods is assessed considering structural performance indices, initial costs, and repair costs associated with anticipated earthquake ground shaking. The results illustrate the seismic performance potential of this structural system and demonstrate the application of a practical seismic performance assessment approach for buildings. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.