Structural Challenge

[John Evans]

Inspected the renovated town home (referred to as rowhomes in Baltimore) shown on the right side of the photos. The adjoining home was demolished a few months ago, following the renovation of the inspected home. The party wall consists mostly of brick, with some patched areas of block. By removing the floor joists, open voids were left in the party wall and diminished the structural integrity of the wall. These are three story homes built in 1910. Recommended review by structural engineer and the city dept. of building permits. It was interesting watching the rats scurry across the vacant site!

[Dale Duffy]

Good gosh, they leave those bricks just hanging there at the front, right next to the entry door of another house, unreal at best---

[Marcel R. Cyr]

John, that is totally amazing and hard to believe that someone would expose the adjacent row house to stuctural breaching as such.

The stucture is exposed to the elements at this point and will further deteriorate at an excellerated pace.

The dangers of an open demolition site as such should be shut down in the publics best interest.

Besides dangling bricks up at the roof level that are ready to fall, there is nothing to prevent the neighborhood kids to wonder in there and hell, in the back, there seems to be a street and an open doorway where anyone could fall through.

This is unreal.

Hope you made a few waves on this one for those people to open their eyes.

Marcel

[Richard A. Hetzel]

It looks like they have preserved the facade and are planning to rebuild. I would verify this before I write any condemning text. The issues are genuine, unless they are temporary.

[Marcel R. Cyr]

Originally Posted by Richard A. Hetzel

It looks like they have preserved the facade and are planning to rebuild. I would verify this before I write any condemning text. The issues are genuine, unless they are temporary.

Richard, planning to re-build or not and wether this was started yesterday or a month ago, Safety to the public and the occupants is at hand.

This site should have been cordon off so nobody get hurt.

Now whether the building is going to suffer from structural defects and detrimental failures from this all depends how long it has been in this condition.

Marcel

[John Evans]

The bldg was apparently demolished 2 months ago. My report comments recommended contacting the property owner, the city and a structural engineer. I was shocked when I first arrived for the inspection. Yes, it is very unsafe for many reasons, and I really questioned the integrity of the wall in the report.

[jkogel]

It's a sure bet some of those rats have found a new home in your building, with all the easy access.

John Kogel
www.allsafehome.ca