Burlington's Seismic Design Category, explained

Under the seismic model IBC and ASCE 7 use for new construction, Burlington is Category B. Low seismic hazard. Code requires basic seismic detailing (bracing, connections) but no special structural system restrictions. Nationally, Burlington ranks above 40% of the 4,875 cities in this dataset for seismic hazard - the 40th percentile.

Burlington by the numbers

The raw figures: peak ground acceleration 0.063g, short-period spectral response 0.131g, 1-second spectral response 0.063g. Among 147 North Carolina cities in this dataset, Burlington ranks 100 for seismic hazard, the 32th percentile within the state. About 61,365 people live in Burlington, North Carolina.

What a retrofit costs in Burlington

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

What this means for insurance

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 Burlington address.

More on how this number was built

The methodology guide covers exactly how USGS's public design-maps API produced Burlington'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.