Columbus, OH: what USGS's seismic model says

USGS's ASCE 7-16 seismic design model - the same standard building codes use - places Columbus in Seismic Design Category B: Low seismic hazard. Code requires basic seismic detailing (bracing, connections) but no special structural system restrictions. That puts Columbus in the 36th percentile nationally for seismic hazard - higher than 36% of the 4,875 US cities USGS was checked against here.

How Columbus compares

The raw figures: peak ground acceleration 0.058g, short-period spectral response 0.117g, 1-second spectral response 0.06g. Among 254 Ohio cities in this dataset, Columbus ranks 208 for seismic hazard, the 18th percentile within the state. About 933,263 people live in Columbus, Ohio.

Bracing and bolting: the actual cost

Outside California, no state-level retrofit grant equivalent to Brace + Bolt could be found for Ohio. 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 Columbus address.

More on how this number was built

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