The role and interpretation of damping in the prediction of human induced floor vibration response levels

The incidence of human-induced vibrations in floor systems in newly constructed commercial buildings that are perceptible, or even worse, annoying, seems to have escalated in recent times. This situation is considered to have arisen as a result of the confluence of a number of contributing factors, mainly that of increased span lengths in flooring systems and lower levels of damping associated with the modern workforces’ shift to the ‘paperless office.’ This paper investigates the latter of these factors further by analysing vibration response measurements on four separate, nominally structurally, identical floor systems (four stories in the same office building). Two of the floors were fully outfitted for imminent release and occupation, one was partly outfitted and the other consisted of just bare structure with installed services but no floor coverings of office equipment. Difficulties encountered in extracting reportable values through the authors’ modelling interpretations are also discussed.