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Comment by notjesse | Hacker News Reader

The other thing is earthquake safety. Wood frame is often far more resilient to sheer stress than concrete/brick. Concrete can be reinforced to mitigate that, but I wonder how viable that is for buildings on the scale of SFH, not major developments.

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Can confirm lived on tbe Big Island of Hawaii for three years. Almost all homes are made of wood with the houses literally standing on top of the volcanic rock or cement pilings. With frequent earthquakes (largest when I lived there was 6.8) the houses literally move, shake and flex.

Concrete just cracks and then crumbles.

...and then has to be rebuilt, by a concrete company!!

It’s not just about reinforcement (like rebar or steel frames) but the concrete mix used. Even though it might not look it, most concrete used in buildings is flexible. The most earthquake proof building in SF is probably the Salesforce tower, which has a concrete core, not a low height timber framed house. Concrete has other great properties as well - it is waterproof, doesn’t rot, and is fireproof. On the emissions side, you can get flexibility and lower emissions by using newer air-crete mixes: https://www.infrastructurist.com/what-is-flexible-concrete/

You're leaving out the fact concrete cracks. We put lines in concrete specifically to control cracks.

There are some pretty massive advantages to using stick-built construction, it's part of the reason it's been so popular for so long.

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