Does Rolling Meadows, IL need an earthquake retrofit?

Under the seismic model IBC and ASCE 7 use for new construction, Rolling Meadows is Category B. Low seismic hazard. Code requires basic seismic detailing (bracing, connections) but no special structural system restrictions. Nationally, Rolling Meadows ranks above 37% of the 4,875 cities in this dataset for seismic hazard - the 37th percentile.

How Rolling Meadows compares

The raw figures: peak ground acceleration 0.06g, short-period spectral response 0.118g, 1-second spectral response 0.061g. Among 330 Illinois cities in this dataset, Rolling Meadows ranks 241 for seismic hazard, the 27th percentile within the state. About 23,732 people live in Rolling Meadows, Illinois.

What a retrofit costs in Rolling Meadows

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

More on how this number was built

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