[mechanical_fish]

Maybe 100 years ago that was some kind of advantage

Interesting choice of date. 100 years ago SF was rebuilding from the giant earthquake that had leveled most of the city three years before.

So, yeah, Detroit's got certain topographical advantages. People just can't remember that, because essentially none of the current residents of the Bay Area were living there in 1906, and human memory is short. But there may come a day when you remember. It'll be one day after one third of the buildings fall down and the water taps stop working.

And now for the public service announcement: If you live in the Bay Area, stockpile some drinking water and bolt your shelves to the wall!

[davidw]

Seismography != Topography :-) They had a big earthquake in 1989, right? So it's not that old a memory in any case.

[gravitycop]

They had a big earthquake in 1989, right?

http://quake.wr.usgs.gov/prepare/future

There are two things wrong with that. First, Loma Prieta was not the big one. It was a moderately big one, certainly destructive to some parts of the Bay Area, but nowhere near the size of the great San Francisco earthquake of 1906. [...] The new report also says that the next one will most likely strike farther north than Loma Prieta, somewhere between San Jose and Santa Rosa on either side of the Bay. The epicenter of the October 1989 quake was in a sparsely populated area. The next one, according to the study, will likely be centered in a more populated area.