Seismic isolation design and resilience improvement of railway station considering the influence of near-fault pulse-like ground motions

To improve the resilience of railway stations, a typical station was selected as the research object, and an isolation design was introduced. Twenty-four groups of near-fault pulse-like ground motions were selected. The seismic resilience of the no-isolation railway stations (NIRS) and the isolation railway stations (IRS) were compared to provide a numerical result of the improvement in resilience. The results show that in the station isolation design, the station’s functional requirements and structural characteristics should be considered and the appropriate placement of isolation bearings is under the waiting room. Under the action of a rare earthquake, the repair cost, repair time, rate of harm and death of the IRS were decreased by 8.04 million, 18.30 days, 6.93×10−3 and 1.21×10−3, respectively, when compared to the NIRS. The IRS received a seismic resilience grade of three-stars and the NIRS only one-star, indicating that rational isolation design improves the seismic resilience of stations. Thus, for the design of stations close to earthquake faults, it is suggested to utilize appropriate isolation techniques to improve their seismic resilience.