Every time a seismic event causes casualties, italian debates go back talking about the ‘building dossiers’, without achieving any results. There have been several bills that have tried to complete this law, but the italian parliament has never completed the process of approval.
WHAT’S THE BUILDING DOSSIER
The ‘building dossier’ is a legal institution. It consists of a file focusing on the health state of the building, which every owner of each building (or the administrator) should keep.
It contains informations about the building, such as:
– identification;
– planning;
– structure;
– plant engineering;
-environment.
The goal would be to gain a suitable framework that includes the construction phases of the building, and record of the changes, compared to the original configuration, in reference to the static, functional and plant components. The dossiers purpose are to provide a frequent update, within a ten years timeframe limit.
WHAT IS IT FOR?
The building dossier is a tool for monitoring and preventing the state of conservation of the italian building stock, aimed at identifying risk situations for the buildings and planning over time renovations and maintenance to improve their quality. Also, the intention is to give the next owners a further chance to evaluate the state of the property during the sale and purchase transitions, also giving them the opportunity to chose a better conserved property. This could trigger a virtuous circle, which involves everyone in keeping the buildings as close as possible to solid and safe standards.
THE EARTHQUAKE OF ISCHIA
The fact that a magnitude four earthquake could be deadly should make us think. Recently the island of Ischia was in fact hit by one, and it is also a territory notoriously vulnerable to seismic, volcanic and hydrogeological risk. What happened was therefore predictable, since the collapsed houses lacked basic building rules.
Certifying the building safety state with the help of the building dossier could be a valid safeguard and civil prevention measure for such events.