  In order to estimate the seismic vulnerability of a densely populated urban
area, it would in principle be necessary to evaluate the dynamic behaviour of
individual and aggregate buildings. These detailed seismic analyses, however,
are extremely cost-intensive and require great processing time and expertise
judgment. The aim of the present study is to propose a new methodology able to
combine information and tools coming from different scientific fields in order
to reproduce the effects of a seismic input in urban areas with known
geological features and to estimate the entity of the damages caused on
existing buildings. In particular, we present new software called ABES
(Agent-Based Earthquake Simulator), based on a Self-Organized Criticality
framework, which allows to evaluate the effects of a sequence of seismic events
on a certain large urban area during a given interval of time. The integration
of Geographic Information System (GIS) data sets, concerning both geological
and urban information about the territory of Avola (Italy), allows performing a
parametric study of these effects on a real context as a case study. The
proposed new approach could be very useful in estimating the seismic
vulnerability and defining planning strategies for seismic risk reduction in
large urban areas
