Falling bricks, not uncommon
The exterior walls of a high rise condominium building is called the
building envelope. Most people think that once the exterior walls are
built, they are maintenance free. That's not so.
Brick walls are not solid brick walls but just a brick veneer that is
one brick thick. Behind the brick are concrete walls with a air gap
between the two.
Over time, the constant contraction and expansion of the bricks from
the daytime high temperatures to the nighttime lows, causes the mortar
to erode and the bricks to crumble.
Weeping holes can get plugged allowing water to build up between the
concrete wall and the bricks. This water can penetrate into the
interior causing mould and water leaks in the apartments. The freezing
and thawing of the water puts pressure on the bricks and mortar until
eventually, individual bricks may crumble or an entire brick may fall.
Design flaw
likely cause of brick fall at Scarborough apartment building: Toronto
Community Housing
Scarborough Mirror
16 April 2015
Design flaws in a Scarborough Village highrise likely led to a wall of
bricks falling off the structure this month, Toronto’s public housing
authority says.
Toronto Community Housing Corporation called in third-party engineers
after four storeys of brick cladding dropped from the top of 3171
Eglinton Avenue East on April 4, asking for an examination of the
building and its twin, 3181 Eglinton.
This week, it said an “unintended” cavity behind the bricks and a “lack
of weeping holes for proper drainage” likely resulted in water freezing
and thawing there, leading over 50 years “to separation of the brick
cladding from the block wall.”
—†—
Understanding
Local Law 11
A Basic Guide to
Facade Inspections
The Cooperator
By Raanan Geberer
Most board members and managers in New York City’s co-op and condo
buildings know the drill when it comes to Local Law 11 inspections,
meaning inspections of the exterior walls of buildings in the city that
are more than six stories. The law and its predecessor, Local Law 10,
have been on the books since 1980. The process itself may not have
changed but Local Law 11 now has a new official name—the Façade
Inspection Safety Program (FISP).
A Little History
The reasons for the facade inspection local laws are straightforward:
they were designed to make building facades safe and to protect
pedestrians below from falling brick, stone, concrete and other
building materials. In this article, we’ll look into the background of
the law, what it entails, and, most importantly, how co-ops and condos
can prepare for mandated facade inspections.
Like many laws and regulations, Local Laws 10 and 11 were prompted by
tragedy. Local Law 10 was passed and signed into law in 1980 by
then-Mayor Ed Koch after a Barnard College student was killed in May
1979 by a piece of terracotta that fell from a building.
That law mandated that a licensed engineer or architect inspect the
outside of every building’s facade every five years by and certify it
as safe. Serious deficiencies must be corrected, and the building given
a second inspection to verify those corrective measures.
Sadly, subsequent accidents—including the death of a 16-year-old
student who was struck by a falling brick, a parapet collapsing in back
of a building, and a shower of debris that fell from an office building
on Madison Avenue—caused Local Law 10 to be replaced by the longer
reach of Local Law 11, which was passed in 1998 and required the entire
perimeter of the building, including courtyards, to be inspected.
Safe, Unsafe,
and SWARMP
The law, according to Alexander Schnell, spokesman for the city
Department of Buildings (DOB), is incorporated into the Administrative
Code as Section 28.302. It covers all buildings that are more than 6
stories in height. According to David May, a partner at SUPERSTRUCTURES
Engineers and Architects, that's more than 12,500 buildings, and filing
is now being done under Cycle 8.
“The conditions reports,” says Schnell, “are filed with the DOB's FISP
Unit on a 5-year cycle. The reports are required to identify the
facades as being one of the following: “Safe,” “Unsafe” or “Safe With a
Repair and Maintenance Program (SWARMP).”
If a façade is classified as SWARMP, the building's owners (or board,
in the case of a co-op or condo) have five years to get the required
repairs done, until the next cycle. Failing that, the building will be
downgraded to `Unsafe’—meaning that the repairs must now be done within
30 days. Although extensions are sometimes granted, these situations
are considered emergencies.
The Inspection
Itself
So, what does a Local Law 11 inspection look like? “These inspections,
at street elevations, may require sidewalk bridging to protect the
public,” says Michael Yates, president of Yates Restoration Group Ltd.
In the Bronx. “This would generally be the case if physical probes must
be inserted into the building, creating a potential hazard if materials
fall to the sidewalk below. However, with proper notification to the
Buildings Department, a sidewalk bridge may not be required if the
inspection is purely visual.”
“Once the architect has filed his or her report, the next step in the
process is normally to have specifications and drawings drafted that
will address the recommended or required scope of repairs,” Yates
continues. “At this time, it is a good idea for the building manager
and board representatives to sit down with the architect to discuss a
budget and options for a final scope of work. Sometimes, due to
immediate budget constraints, the ultimate decision may be to forgo
longer-term recommended repair work, and to limit the scope to what is
absolutely required in order to address hazardous or 'safe with
maintenance' items.”
Once the final scope of work is determined, Yates says the architect
will provide bid documents to a list of contractors, who will each bid
on the project. Once a bid is accepted, the architect will file the
project with the Buildings Department. The contractor will also design
and file for any needed scaffold permits.
“Finally,” says Yates, “with permits in place, the contractor will
mobilize the project, make his submittals, and commence work. Usually,
the architect of record is kept on to inspect and administer the
contract. Weekly or bi-weekly meetings with the contractor, architect,
and building manager all in attendance is definitely recommended
throughout the project, and helps ensure that progress goes smoothly
and without unwanted surprises. The contractor should be expected to
maintain the project schedule, and to provide periodic updates due to
days lost from inclement weather, or extensions due to changes in
scope. The optimal contractor is an excellent communicator who manages
the project in a way that enlists the cooperation of the architect,
building manager, and other building representatives; who manages
expectations and plans ahead; ensures safety and quality; and gets the
job done on time and on budget.”
Rand Engineering and Architecture’s “FISP Fact Sheet,” provided to this
publication by Peter Scallion, Rand's marketing manager, gives some
examples of what qualifies as Unsafe and SWARMP conditions. He notes
that unsafe conditions include “loose bricks, mortar, or concrete;
shifted parapet walls or stonework; and loose items [such as flower
pots] on fire escapes or windowsills.” Examples of SWARMP conditions
can include cracked or spalled masonry, deteriorated mortar joints,
deflected window lintels or damaged coatings.
Terraces and
Balconies
There has been one significant recent change in the inspection process.
Now, inspection and testing of balcony railings and guards, including
fire escapes, must be included in the body of Cycle 8 reports,
according to Schnell. Roof parapets and roof decks are also included.
Even hairline cracks in concrete balconies or terraces can lead to more
serious problems, especially in this area’s cold weather. A most recent
incident involved a 35-year old advertising executive, who was killed
in a tragic accident in August 2013 when the railing of the Upper East
Side apartment balcony she was on collapsed causing her to fall 17
stories. A DOB investigation later revealed the railing was not up to
code.
As has been the case since the beginning of the program, the Department
of Buildings is responsible for enforcing Local Law 11, now FISP.
Sometimes the Department of Transportation (DOT) gets involved, if a
street must be closed off because scaffolding is being erected. But the
actual inspection is done by a licensed contractor or professional
engineer, termed a “qualified exterior wall inspector,” who then
submits his or her findings to the DOB.
Facade inspection reports must be filed no later than 60 days after the
engineer or architect conducts the final visual inspection and no later
than one year after the hands-on inspection, or “scaffold drop,”
according to May. “Building owners need to promptly approve, sign, and
return reports to the engineer/architect for timely filing with the DOB
to avoid the need for re-inspection.”
Often times, the DOB then sends its own inspectors to re-inspect the
facades. “Recently, I saw a man standing across the street from the
building with a clipboard and looking the building up and down,” says
one exterior contractor. “I asked him what he was doing, and he said,
`I’m a buildings inspector.’” He was taking pictures and writing down
all the conditions that the original inspector had missed.
Violations
If a building owner, board or manager has not filed an acceptable
façade report within the acceptable time frame, says Dawn Falco, a
consulting attorney with Jack Jaffa & Associates, a Brooklyn-based
real estate consulting firm, the city will issue a violation for
failing to comply. “That ticket does have a first offense fee of $800,”
she says.
“What happens next could go in either direction,” she says. “If an
acceptable report is filed shortly thereafter, the firm will need to
certify the correction and the violation will be removed from the
property records. If this isn’t done in a timely manner, however, a
second offense can be issued.”
One factor that complicates things is that the DOB issues two types of
violations, DOB violations and ECB (Environmental Control Board)
violations, which have different procedures for remediation. If a
building is deemed to be unsafe, the owner or manager, for some
conditions, must immediately install a sidewalk shed to protest the
public on all facades. Management must also submit to DOB an extension
request for repairs if the repair work cannot be completed in 30 days.
As long as extensions are approved, the DOB won’t assess any fines.
Management must also submit to DOB a letter from an architectural or
engineering firm stating the scope of work, timetable for repairs, and
confirmation that the proper safety measures are in place, according to
Rand Engineering. “After the unsafe conditions have been corrected, the
engineer/architect administering the repair program will file an
amended report with the DOB upgrading the building’s status to SWARMP
or Safe.”
Advice to
Boards, Managers
Several of the professionals we interviewed routinely give advice to
boards and building managers. May says “Buildings should have the FISP
critical examination performed by an engineering or architecture firm
with substantial experience in façade and repair. Make available any
relevant documentation concerning the façade, original blueprints,
prior FISP reports and specifications for recent façade repair work.”
In the event that repairs are required, May continues, “The FISP report
is not intended to be a project specification. If repairs are required,
have your E/A (engineering/architecture) firm prepare contract
documents that clearly delineate the work to be performed and materials
to be employed. A clear set of construction documents helps assure the
lowest contract price (best value) and quickest completion schedule for
the intended scope of work,” he says.
In addition, May recommends that you consider commissioning a more
comprehensive report from your engineering or architecture firm.
“Because FISP simply requires observed effects to be identified and
classified as Safe, Safe with a Repair and Maintenance Program (SWARMP)
or unsafe, the critical examination report is essentially a catalog of
defects. It does not address in any detail the underlying causes of the
observed symptoms or repair procedure, or maintenance items that may
prevent minor defects from further deterioration.”
Finally, says May, “conduct the critical examination early within the
reporting sub-cycle, particularly if there are outstanding SWARMP
conditions from the previous Cycle 7, which must be repair prior to
filing the Cycle 8 report, to avoid defaulting to Unsafe. This would
permit the owner to address any `new’ Cycle 8 defects observed along
with the Cycle 7 items in a single repair campaign.”
Falco advises, “Use your due diligence. Use a registered architect or
engineer who has had extensive experience with inspections.”
According to the pros, there's no secret to successful compliance with
Local Law 11—it's just a matter of choosing an experienced, insured
contractor, and not procrastinating when it comes to getting mandated
repairs done and documented.
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