Earthquake Safety in Traditional Japanese Houses

Sustainable Travel Japan

Ayumi & Uberto are an international couple living in Fukuoka who know a lot about earthquake resistant traditional Japanese buildings. Ayumi wrote an excellent Medium blog about it and another about how Japanese students are educated and trained to survive an earthquake. They have been renovating and living in an old Japanese house KOMINKA after many years living in Europe.

Budget: They bought the house for 30 million yen and spent 5 million yen on earthquake resistance seismic retrofit remodeling as well as another 10 million on other renovations. They got 1 million yen back from the government for making use of an AKIYA abandoned house, but couldn't qualify for the subsidy for making the house more earthquake-proof.

Earthquake safety of old houses is such a big issue this year due to the horrible Noto Peninsula earthquake which destroyed so many traditional homes. But Ayumi says it's not the design of the traditional buildings which is the problem- it's more termite or rot damage and lack of upkeep.

Ayumi's article, "What is an earthquake resistant house?"

https://medium.com/@Japanlifeagain/whats-an-earthquake-resistant-house-89a32c7978d7

Background Music thanks to Casey Bean- download your own copy and support his original musical journey on Bandcamp: https://caseybean.bandcamp.com/