Does Atlanta, GA need an earthquake retrofit?

USGS's ASCE 7-16 seismic design model - the same standard building codes use - places Atlanta in Seismic Design Category C: Moderate seismic hazard. Code adds irregular-building restrictions and requires bracing of some nonstructural components (e.g. tall shelving, water heaters) in addition to structural detailing. That puts Atlanta in the 69th percentile nationally for seismic hazard - higher than 69% of the 4,875 US cities USGS was checked against here.

How Atlanta compares

The raw figures: peak ground acceleration 0.093g, short-period spectral response 0.185g, 1-second spectral response 0.085g. Among 148 Georgia cities in this dataset, Atlanta ranks 79 for seismic hazard, the 47th percentile within the state. About 520,070 people live in Atlanta, Georgia.

Bracing and bolting: the actual cost

Outside California, no state-level retrofit grant equivalent to Brace + Bolt could be found for Georgia. A typical retrofit still runs $5,000-$10,000 nationally, about $7,000 for a common single-family job.

Earthquake insurance for a Atlanta home

Outside California, earthquake coverage is typically sold as an endorsement added to a standard homeowners policy, not a separate product - worth asking about directly when getting a home-insurance quote for a Atlanta address.

More on how this number was built

The methodology guide covers exactly how USGS's public design-maps API produced Atlanta's numbers. The guide to what a Seismic Design Category actually means covers why a category is never a substitute for an engineer's assessment of one specific house.