Massena's Seismic Design Category, explained

Massena 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, Massena ranks above 79% of the 4,875 cities in this dataset for seismic hazard - the 79th percentile.

How Massena compares

The raw figures: peak ground acceleration 0.278g, short-period spectral response 0.438g, 1-second spectral response 0.098g. Among 170 New York cities in this dataset, Massena ranks 3 for seismic hazard, the 99th percentile within the state. About 9,998 people live in Massena, New York.

What a retrofit costs in Massena

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

More on how this number was built

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