Because of recent increases in safety standards, both the renovation and new school proposals for Gordon would be built to a safety standard even greater than the newest school in the city, Dickens Elementary school.

Bruce Gregg and Cathy Marr, both engineers, explain the building code standards in more detail:

The building code defines what design standards must be met. When setting these standards, a vast array of considerations are weighed and the code reflects what, in the opinion of these scientist and engineers, is necessary to have in the design of a building to completely meet its functional requirements. With the 2005 version of the code, the seismic standards have been increased beyond those of a decade ago when the last code was released. Any building, new or renovated, built to the standards of today will be designed to outperform any building built to the previous code. Building codes are under continuous review and incorporate the latest science and engineering knowledge available. "The earthquake acceleration values have been adjusted to provide a more geographically accurate calculation of the earthquake effects on structures. Dynamic analysis has been established as the default analysis method for earthquake design"*. This is a quantum leap in seismic design requirements. Buildings, renovated or new, designed under the new 2005 building code will be safe.

It is important to bear in mind the “earthquake-resistant” design attempts to provide a structure, its foundation, and its contents with the strength and deformation characteristics necessary to enable it to survive the design earthquake. Although it is theoretically possible to design a structure to be "earthquake proof," implying no damage or malfunction under the maximum predictable ground motions, this would be prohibitively expensive. Instead, the design philosophy for ordinary buildings is to guard against total collapse and consequent loss of life but accept the possibility of some damage."*. Life safety is paramount in all situations. True assured post-disaster use is beyond the scope of normal projects and without vast financial resources cannot even be considered.

Too often the discussion of relative safety revolves around the return period of an event. The return period is, in fact, a "shorthand" way to communicate quickly and concisely a wide range or probability functions and theoretical event magnitudes. The building code takes into consideration the magnitudes of potential events and their theoretical frequency, not simply a return period. The return period does not in any way relate to when, or even if, the "big one" will occur. For a given return period there could be a "big one", a few "moderate ones" or many "small ones", all with finite probabilities. The need is to build or renovate a structure to handle the code-defined ground movement dynamics and to ensure that the final product meets those standards.

*From NRC-CNRC