Applied Research to Improve Manufactured-Home Communities

In this episode of DesignSafe Radio, structural engineer Elaina Sutley covers ways that research can tangibly improve resilience of manufactured homes. She discusses local amendments to building codes that cities can implement. Currently, she and her research team are studying mobile home parks and ways to reduce wind damage. She emphasizes that dealing with windstorms is more than a building design problem, since residents in these vulnerable structures are often the most socially vulnerable. We also need systems in place to help people recover from natural disasters.

Elaina Sutley’s research group at University of Kansas, Advancing Disaster Resilience Science on Communities and Housing.Wind damage data collected by Sutley and other natural hazards researchers is available at the DesignSafe Data Depot repository.