Study on the Relocation of Existing Building and Seismic Isolation Design – Illustrated by the Kaohsiung Buddhist Hall

The Kaohsiung Buddhist Hall is a 2-story reinforced concrete building located in Kaohsiung City, Taiwan. The building is rectangular in plane with about 26.2 m in length, 17.8 m in width, and 11.12 m in height. The roof form of the hall is an arc arch, and a tower is at the front center of the building with a height of about 31.4 m. Because a new construction will be conducted on the site of the Kaohsiung Buddhist Hall, the relocated engineering of the Kaohsiung Buddhist Hall should be carried out, which could revitalize and promote urban development. Since the age of the building is more than 50 years, the aseismic capacity of this building could not meet the current aseismic code, and consequently, a retrofit design of the building structure should be required. The existing appearance of the Kaohsiung Buddhist Hall would be changed with excessive structure retrofitted. In order to decrease the amount of structure retrofit, a seismic isolation system under the foundation of the building, with friction pendulums, will be designed to reduce the seismic force to meet the requirements of the seismic design code. For meeting the latest regulations of the seismic design code, the efficacy of the seismic isolation system will be analyzed by response spectrum and time history dynamic analysis.