Transportation around the Los Angeles area was severely afflicted with roadway failures and the partial collapse of several major freeway interchanges . The near total failure of the Lower Van Norman Dam resulted in the evacuation of tens of thousands of downstream residents , though an earlier decision to maintain the water at a lower level may have contributed to saving the dam from being overtopped . Schools were affected , as they had been during the 1933 Long Beach earthquake , but this time amended construction styles improved the outcome for the thousands of school buildings in the Los Angeles area . Another result of the event involved the hundreds of various types of landslides that were documented in the San Gabriel Mountains . As had happened following other earthquakes in California , legislation related to building codes was once again revised , with laws that specifically addressed the construction of homes or businesses near known active fault zones
1933 Long Beach earthquake
1933 Long Beach earthquake
1971 San Fernando earthquake