Perspectives On Development And Current Applications For Catastrophe Planning

The commentaries in this chapter represent three important perspectives: academic research in earthquake engineering; the federal agency that sponsors and oversees HAZUS®; and expert users. Rachel Davidson fills in some gaps in the background and suggests directions for the development of HAZUS®, including improving its mitigation planning capability and structural inventory data, as well as providing for web-based user overrides based on post-catastrophe observations. Phil Schneider presents several examples of user-driven developments in HAZUS® and the role of users in pushing forward improvements and enhancements that are currently in the works, by members of the self-established user/developer consortia. Finally, Subrahmanyam Muthukumar, an expert HAZUS® user, confirms Schneider’s proposition that user input based on experience with applications of the software provide significant pull for its development. Muthukumar suggests several improvements to HAZUS®, including more dynamic inventory data, better cost-benefit analysis capability, and lifeline/network models integrated into the overall system.