The Role of Physical Planning in Mitigating Urban Vulnerability against Earthquake

One of critical elements to reduce the damage of earthquake is the community`s preparation to confront it. Making preparations to confront earthquake can be treated in many ways. By applying physical planning mechanisms, cities can be designed and planned in a way that they suffer the least damage during the earthquake. This paper tries to Study the role of urban physical planning and concerning urban topics such as urban structure, urban texture, urban form and urban density within theoretical framework of urban planning in mitigating earthquake damages. Diverse urban structures show different reactions against the earthquake. For instance, multi-center urban structures are able to handle the earthquake better than single center structures. By increasing the ratio of built area to whole area of parcel or to open space, the vulnerability of open space due to piled up debris in it will be decreased substantially. Some land-uses play a crucial role in situating urban vulnerability against the earthquake. These land-uses are called "Special Land-Uses". Due to their critical function in confronting earthquake, any damage to these land-uses during the earthquake, may lead to catastrophic consequences. Hence, it is imperative to appoint special land-uses with delicate and knowledgeable consideration so that the least damage will be suffered by these centers.