On Monday, the government finally launched an online database with highly anticipated maps showing the areas in eight cities and counties that are potentially prone to soil liquefaction.
Since this is information that the whole country is greatly concerned about, more than 1 million people instantly flooded onto the database after its launch.
When typing in their own addresses on the site to do a search, many of these users must have been worried about the results of the three-color system that represents levels of vulnerability — “green” representing low vulnerability, “yellow” representing medium vulnerability and “red” representing high vulnerability. Such results are crucial to the users’ lives and safety and those of their loved ones, as well as to the value of their property.
As it released the soil liquefaction data, the government also tried to fulfill its responsibility to put the public at ease. It offered people some related information and instructed the public to conduct checks on their own initiative. It also said that if there is a need for professional consultation, it is possible to apply to obtain their building’s structural design drawings, as well as geological survey reports, and to contact geotechnical engineers at the soil liquefaction workstations in every city and county. This shows that the government is trying its best to serve the public in the hope that it will be able to reduce anxiety over the data, while at the same time taking the opportunity to increase disaster-prevention awareness.
Still, it would be good if the government could be a bit more conscientious as it goes about its business. Take Siding Borough (溪定) in Tainan’s Annan District (安南), for example. More than 300 buildings in the borough were damaged by soil liquefaction during the earthquake on Feb. 6, and it was also the largest area and with the most-concentrated liquefaction. Why was the borough not marked as one of the red areas representing high vulnerability on the maps? Should the government not also have mentioned how many of the areas showed signs of soil liquefaction during the earthquake, and will it offer any further explanations?
If the accuracy of this assessment tool is as low as the damage caused by the Feb. 6 earthquake implies, then perhaps the people who have found that their property is in areas where there is a high potential risk of liquefaction should relax a bit.
The government should not draw up its soil liquefaction prevention policy based on individual households. Instead, it should be drawn based on regions. Take, for example, the buildings damaged in Siding Borough during the earthquake. Apart from the damage caused by soil liquefaction, other damage was caused by the regional geographical environment. Even if someone spends a lot of money on house repairs and improvement, essential utilities could still be damaged by regional soil liquefaction, and this could also affect the safety of the living environment.
Since the government is willing to publicly face the challenge posed by soil liquefaction, it should start to tackle the issue of the quake resistance of public facilities in areas of medium and high vulnerability. Another issue is whether facilities closely related to people’s livelihood, including riverbanks, mass transportation networks and schools, are able to resist soil liquefaction. The government should address and clarify such questions in a timely manner, instead of making people nervous by only pointing to the problem.
Lu Chih-wei is an associate professor in the Department of Construction Engineering at National Kaohsiung First University.
Translated by Eddy Chang
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