L’Aquila is a much bigger city than Coalinga. Also, L’Aquila was built on an old lake bed - it may have had worse soil characteristics than Coalinga.
That said, one of the most survivable quake structures is the American wood-frame house. We have plenty of urban areas in quake zones with unreinforced masonry, though, and we’re going to have our own disaster in time.
Having lived in southern California my entire life, I always do a little double-take when visiting homes in the midwest......the number of “doo-dads” on top of wall rails and all over the houses remind me that these folks have never had to do a pickup.
survivable quake structures
A very survivable structure is the straw bale house (Google if you don’t know about them, also check out this article about how they could save many lives in the world:
http://www.ecobusinesslinks.com/straw_bale/straw_bale_solar_sustainable_development.htm
In June of 06 I traveled the hurricane coast from Tampa to New Orleans. I located a small straw bale house that had been build behind Pensacola, FL. It had survived Hurricane Hugo with no damage whatsoever, although foot thick trees were blown down 100 yards away. I hear that straw bale homes built in earthquake country do very well too.