Cedartown's Seismic Design Category, explained

Cedartown carries Seismic Design Category C under USGS's ASCE 7-16 model. 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. Nationally, Cedartown ranks above 75% of the 4,875 cities in this dataset for seismic hazard - the 75th percentile.

Cedartown by the numbers

The raw figures: peak ground acceleration 0.167g, short-period spectral response 0.288g, 1-second spectral response 0.096g. Among 148 Georgia cities in this dataset, Cedartown ranks 11 for seismic hazard, the 93th percentile within the state. About 10,313 people live in Cedartown, 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.

Insuring against this, not just retrofitting

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 Cedartown address.

More on how this number was built

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