Near-fault ground motion bi-normalized pseudo-velocity spectra and its applications

Abstract

Ground motions with forward-directivity effect in the near-fault region are obviously different from ordinary far-field ground motions. Design spectral models for this kind of motions have been proposed by correlating simple pulses with parameters attenuation relationships in a previous study of the authors. To further test the applicability of the established design spectral model, we analyze ground motion pseudo-velocity response spectra (PVS), normalized pseudo-velocity spectra (NPVS) and bi-normalized pseudo-velocity spectra (BNPVS) of 53 typical near-fault forward-directivity ground motions. It is found that BNPVS not only has more salient features to reflect the difference between soil and rock sites, but also has less scattering to reveal the nature of forward-directivity motions. And then, BNPVS is used for prediction of design spectra accounting for the influence of site conditions, and the constructed design spectra are compared with those spectra established previously. It is concluded that site condition can heavily affect ground motions, buildings on rock can be even more dangerous than those on soil sites, in particular for ordinary buildings with short to middle vibration periods. Finally, pulse models are also suggested for structural analyses in the near-fault region.