Elyria's Seismic Design Category, explained

USGS's ASCE 7-16 seismic design model - the same standard building codes use - places Elyria in Seismic Design Category B: Low seismic hazard. Code requires basic seismic detailing (bracing, connections) but no special structural system restrictions. Nationally, Elyria ranks above 43% of the 4,875 cities in this dataset for seismic hazard - the 43th percentile.

Elyria by the numbers

The raw figures: peak ground acceleration 0.067g, short-period spectral response 0.128g, 1-second spectral response 0.05g. Among 254 Ohio cities in this dataset, Elyria ranks 161 for seismic hazard, the 37th percentile within the state. About 53,604 people live in Elyria, Ohio.

What a retrofit costs in Elyria

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 Elyria address.

More on how this number was built

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