Microsoft
Some drywall is gone from Building 2 on the Microsoft campus.
“From concrete and steel framing to carpets, ceiling tiles, electronic and networking gear, interior debris and loose assets like furniture, chairs and whiteboards, to even the artificial turf outside — most of the materials in the old spaces will find a new life,” the company said in a statement.
Source: Microsoft begins demolishing buildings in Redmond campus remodel
Hundreds of thousands of New Jersey residents live in flood zones that can become inundated with storm water. But the state is trying to move some of them out of harm’s way in one of the biggest home buyout programs in the nation.
The exterior of the Lockridge Medical Clinic, pre-demolition. (Courtesy Montana Preservation Alliance)
The FLWBC notes that this is the first viable, or mostly un-altered, Wright building to be torn down in 40 years, and that it was listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The demolition was done by developer Mick Ruis in Whitefish, Montana.
Source: Frank Lloyd Wright building in Montana is demolished overnight – Archpaper.com
COURTESY PHOTO: PORTLAND CHRONICLE – Builder Peter Kusyk began demolition of a Northeast Portland church in April. Kusyk’s Firenze Development has faced off with neighbors of a Northeast Porltand bungalow because of concerns about lead in the demolition dust.
The problem was, as neighbors were to learn, the letter referred to lead levels in water running off a landfill. It had nothing to do with lead dust flying from a demolition.
Source: Pamplin Media Group – NE Portland demolition dust-up highlights fears over lead paint
There is a proposed Senate Bill for Oregon to require a lead paint-based paint survey prior to a building demolition.
If SB871 passes it means that buildings must be surveyed for lead paint, in addition to the already required asbestos survey before being demolished. This information would then be available to the public by request.
In short, if you are living next to a building scheduled for demolition, you have the right to know if there is asbestos in that building. With the passing of SB871, you will have the right to know if there is lead paint in that building too.
Listed below are the bill sponsors who are waiting to hear from you. Each name is linked to their email. Please take a moment to let them know that you support this important legislation.
| Sen. Michael Dembrow [D] | Rep. Alissa Keny-Guyer [D] | Sen. Lew Frederick [D] | Sen. Kathleen Taylor [D] |
| Rep. Mitch Greenlick [D] | Rep. Ken Helm [D] | Rep. Tina Kotek [D] | Rep. Sheri Malstrom [D] |
| Rep. Robert Nosse [D] | Rep. Karin Power [D] | Rep. Jeff Reardon [D] | Rep. Tawna Sanchez [D] |
| Date | Chamber | Action |
|---|---|---|
| 2017-03-02 | Senate | Referred to Environment and Natural Resources. |
| 2017-02-28 | Senate | Introduction and first reading. Referred to President’s desk. |
The former Green Hotel, on Cooper Street in Woodbury, on Friday, April 24, 2015. (Staff photo by Jason Laday)
“The process has already begun, demolishing the building,” said Camden Diocese spokesman Peter Feuerherd on Friday.
The city planning and zoning board in August 2014 voted 6-1 to approve the demolition, over the protests of the members of Woodbury’s Historic Preservation Commission.
The building once known as the Green Castle Hotel, originally built in 1881 and turned into apartments in 1920, has been the subject of debate between Holy Angels Parish and preservation advocates for years.
VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland studied the reuse of structural elements in the ReUSE (Repetitive Utilization of Structural Elements) project, which recently ended. VTT also proposes the development requirements for improving the planning linked with demolition and repair. Of these, the most pivotal are the development of the guidelines and legislation supporting reuse, in addition to showing, by means of example targets, the commercial and ecological benefits that can be obtained.
In 2011, Kid Rock had words for a video on his song title, ‘Care,’ painted on the empty Grand Circus Park building that once housed the offices of AAA of Michigan. (Daniel Mears / The Detroit News)
via Demolition begins on Detroit building featured in Kid Rock video | The Detroit News.
This is a great story – recommend reading it.
In 1960, while a construction crew dismantled a row of brownstones right across from my own brownstone studio on East 58th Street, I was inspired to, somehow immortalize those buildings. I had the vision of 43 women in formal dress adorning the windows of the skeletal facade.
Most professional photographers dream of having one signature picture they are known for. “GIRLS IN THE WINDOWS ” is mine.
This tear down on Southeast Knapp Street in Eastmoreland was not considered a demolition by the city because part of the old house remained intact. Melissa Binder/The Oregonian
At the root of the debate are two technical aspects of city code. The waiver is the first.
…
Developers may choose to be courteous, but the delay and notification requirement was never intended as a kindness to neighbors, said Ross Caron, spokesman for the development bureau.
The requirement was added to city code in 1988 to prevent large backlogs of vacant land from building up. The waiver option was added in 1990 to allow property owners to move forward more quickly if they were ready to build.
The second technicality neighbors cite as a problem involves what the city considers a true demolition — and the difference between a demolition and a remodel.
This tear down on Southeast Knapp Street in Eastmoreland was not considered a demolition by the city because part of the old house remained intact.
City code defines a demolition as a complete removal of a structure. If any portion of the to-be-razed home remains — say a bit of wall or floor framing — a demolition permit is unnecessary. An alteration or addition permit is required, but that does not involve a delay or notifying neighbors.
There have been about 2,700 alteration and addition permits thus far this year, up 24 percent from 2011. Projects range from remodeling a bathroom to building an entirely new home with a bit of an old wall or floor still intact.
To the city, these technicalities are separate issues. To neighbors the problem is uniform: Homes are being torn down, and they’re being caught by surprise.
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New homes are being built in established neighborhoods throughout Portland, particularly in the Southeast. Photographed here, a new home nearly four times the size of houses around it is being constructed in Mt. Scott-Arleta. (Melissa Binder/The Oregonian)
Via Home demolitions skyrocket in Portland, neighbors demand advance warning | OregonLive.com
PHILADELPHIA — The demolition contractor in June’s disastrous collapse of a Philadelphia building has been charged with six counts of third-degree murder, District Attorney Seth Williams announced Monday.
Williams said Griffin Campbell was “motivated by greed” – trying to maximize the salvage value of building materials – and elected not to use the safe but more labor-intensive way of razing the building at 2136 Market St.
An unsupported wall of the four-story building toppled on June 5, flattening the roof of the adjacent Salvation Army thrift store and crushing six people. Thirteen others were injured.
Last month, the Department of Licenses and Inspections decided to demolish a portion of the vacant Gretz Brewery (located at the intersection of Oxford and Germantown Ave.) which had been deemed “imminently dangerous”. Though the long vacant (since 1961, when the brewery shut down) building is chock full of L&I violations, the current owner is appealing them.
via Gretz Brewery Partially Demolished, Remainder Still Stands – Demowatch – Curbed Philly.
Jim Hulce of Niagara Worldwide, Niagara, is helping lead the wood salvage project at the former Mirro plant in downtown Manitowoc. / Sue Pischke/HTR Media file
He estimates about one-third of 6 million board feet of northern hemlock will be salvageable for sale as a commodity on the wood market. “We have dozens of interested parties …we need people to stand up and make an order,” Spirtas said.
…
But without the demolition permit, city officials have prohibited crews from harvesting the century-old northern hemlock wood beams comprising the subfloor, as well as the steel beams and columns comprising the skeletal structure of the 900,000-square-foot building.
via Mirro building owner sees salvage value in wood, brick, steel | HTR Media | htrnews.com.
Dumped trash and roofing shingles litter the grounds of Harry B. Hutchins Middle School in Detroit on Friday, October 18, 2013. / Brian Kaufman/Detroit Free Press
Detroit Public Schools is looking to beat scrappers at their own game.
The district is seeking companies to brick-in or demolish as many as 62 schools in exchange for the salvage materials inside them, according to a request for information DPS released Thursday.
DPS has 87 buildings for lease or sale, many of which are blighted or suffering from varying degrees of vandalism. But with a budget of only $150,000 to secure vacant buildings, the district can’t stay ahead of scrappers who break in and steal everything from lockers to windows.
And with bond money spent and a deficit of about $82 million, demolishing blighted schools is no longer in the budget.
FLINT, MI — The organization overseeing the demolition of hundreds of Flint homes has banned salvagers from entering them and taking materials before they are razed.
Unlike black market copper and metal thieves, there is a legitimate trade in salvaging materials from forgotten homes. Some of these people say there is surely value to be found in the 1,600 homes targeted for demolition in Flint.
“Like banisters and chandeliers and stained glass windows,” said Nick Hoffman. “All those artifacts from the house. The details of the home.”
Hoffman runs Carriagetown Antique Center in Flint. He sees the demand for pieces like this all the time, what he calls architectural salvage.
“A lot of people want the new houses, but they want the vintage look,” Hoffman said.
The Genesee County Land Bank, however, is not allowing people to salvage these homes before teardown, even though some people are inquiring, said Doug Weiland, the executive director of the land bank.
via Salvaging banned at Flint homes scheduled for demolition | MLive.com.
A property on Green Street, photographed Friday, Oct. 4, in Marianna, is one of 26 on the city’s dilapidated structures list. Owners still have time to renovate or tear down targeted buildings before the city steps in to demolish them.
MARIANNA — More than two dozen neighborhood eyesores have been targeted for demolition by officials in Marianna. And for owners looking to save their property from the bulldozer, that window of opportunity is growing smaller.
via 26 sites tagged for demolition in Marianna – Jackson County Floridan : News.
Nearly all of the buildings are slated for destruction, but the HP complex (targeted in the center of the ring of the new Apple Campus 2 “spaceship” building) will likely be the first to go.
“We plan to bulldoze all the buildings on the new site,” Apple’s chief executive Tim Cook said in February. The company will then “build one 2.8 million square foot building that will be the most collaborative work environment.”
He added, “I project that we will move in in 2016.”
via Structures getting demolished as Apple Campus 2 guts the remains of HP.
NORTHAMPTON – The Historical Commission imposed the demolition delay ordinance on two Paradise Road buildings that Smith College wants to tear down, but said it will lift it as soon as Smith submits a commitment letter saying it intends to salvage certain architectural features of the buildings.
But while the Cornelius admittedly has its troubles, with fire and water damage helping to deliver a dreaded “U” sign in its windows marking it as unsafe amidst numerous code violations, demolishing it would be a further blight on this developer’s record.
Moyer once was part of an effort to connect the North and South Park Blocks, which would have created one long strip of downtown green space, comparable to Barcelona’s Las Ramblas, but also would have knocked down several historic buildings in its path. It’s as if TMT is trying to rekindle that defeated effort by single-handedly demolishing the historic architecture of Park Avenue.
Culver Building (photo by Brian Libby)
via Portland Architecture: Two handsome old downtown buildings, but only one may survive.
Despite the tireless efforts of volunteers in the Rockaways and other areas hit hard by Hurricane Sandy, some homes simply could not be salvaged. Over the weekend, The NY Times reported that the city Department of Buildings has slated over 200 of these homes for demolition across the boroughs. Another 500 properties still need to be inspected to see if they too will face the same fate.
Read this article on Bulldozers to Demolish 200 Hurricane Sandy-Damaged Homes in New York | Inhabitat New York City.
OCEAN CITY – Demolition crews, officials, and residents of Ocean City are hoping that in a few weeks, the historic site of the Bellevue hotel will be transformed, from unsafe building, to an open lot.
It was a process that began in August, when a neighboring business owner noticed that the building looked swollen on one side.
It turned out, water had pooled on the roof, weakening the building and sealing its fate.
“The building has been deemed unsafe, it’s been tagged, nobody’s allowed in the building, nobody’s allowed against the building because of structural damage,” said William Jackson, who is supervising the demolition.
Demolition officials we spoke with said the whole process should take around four weeks, longer than a usual demolition because of the building’s close proximity to power lines, other buildings, and people.
Local residents, even those who have been in Ocean City all their lives, say it’s time for The Bellevue to go.
“It’s a shame it had to come down. It’s in such disrepair, it has to come down. But they just let it go too long before they took care of it” said Julius Green, a lifelong Ocean City resident.
The Ocean City Council will vote tonight to approve $165,000, the cost of the demolition contract. Officials say the Bellevue’s owner was notified, but hasn’t contributed to demolition costs.
“Through his representatives he demonstrated they could not take that on themselves, and so the city can take it down and place a lien on the property,” said Ocean City Business Administrator Michael Dattilo.
No matter what the vote is tonight, Dattilo says the building is coming down either way, and he’s confident the council will approve the funds.
via Demolition of historic Bellevue Hotel begins in Ocean City – NBC40.net.
The abandoned house at 4406 Brooklyn Ave. has been a blight on the Ivanhoe neighborhood for years.
No more.
On Wednesday, Kansas City Mayor Sly James, wearing a bow tie, a blue hard hat and an orange safety vest, climbed into the cab of an idling excavator and pulled a lever that unleashed the steel claw poised over the roof.
Wham ! Crackle! Whoosh.
Up from the smashed bungalow that someone once called home rose a cloud of plaster dust that choked onlookers, but James just grinned.
“It was a hoot,” he said later. “I loved it.”
James thinks the neighbors of that decaying hulk and 1,000 others just like it will love City Hall, too, when he makes good on his pledge to demolish or deconstruct all those houses and commercial buildings in the next 24 months.
Voters passed a half-cent sales tax in August that will produce millions of dollars to fund parks and public works improvements. But a side benefit is an accompanying use tax on out-of-state sales that will provide the city with a stream of income — up to $5 million a year — to get rid of the backlog of unsafe and unsightly buildings that depress neighbors’ property values.
Until now, the city has had only enough money in the budget to remove 130 houses a year. The new income stream will ramp up the pace nearly sevenfold, according to the mayor’s office.
The house James flattened is the first of 157 to come down between now and March, he said.
“This is just tear the sucker down,” James said, “and haul it away.”
Others will in some cases be taken apart carefully to salvage materials, with the work being carried out by inner-city residents who’ve been trained for the task by the Green Impact Zone.
via Mayor takes down dangerous building as demolition program begins – KansasCity.com.
The Cadilac Paint and Varnish Co. factory on Eliot Street in Ashland may be torn down if town officials have their way.
via Ashland again mulling demolition of old factory – Framingham, MA – The MetroWest Daily News.
Jack Elementary School opened in 1942 and sat on a promontory above a city waste treatment plant that occasionally emited odors. It was also on Munjoy Hill, the poorest section of Portland, Maine.
Jack Elementary was Portland’s largest school until the time of its closure. The school made headlines when 100% of the teachers, administrators and other employees of the school reported symptoms related to mold poisoning from Stachybotrys chartarum. The mold can cause symptoms that are flu-like down up to pulmonary hemorrhage.
The school was closed in 2001 and then later torn down as a result of the mold contamination. Students from the school were reassigned to three other schools within the city. In place of Jack Elementary School, a new school was built named Portland’s East End Community School. As of September 2005, construction was approximately 55% complete with a projected cost of $9.2 million and was completed by Spring 2006.
In its prime, the school was an impressive building. There were huge hallways with massive solid wood doors opening into large-size classrooms with high ceilings. The playground behind the school was built in the late 80’s by a cooperative effort involving contractors, school faculty and students, as well as members of the community who brought their own tools and donated their time. The new playground was said to be the largest and most modern playground in the city school system when it was finished.
When I heard the school was being torn down I couldn’t wait to get in there and photograph the process. I snuck into the construction site once everyone went home for the day and photographed Jack Elementary School in the middle of its destruction. This is one of my favorite images from that day.
via ELEMENTARY SCHOOL DEMOLITION BLACK AND WHITE by susannahwingate.
The City of Syracuse is looking at ways to improve the way it handles dangerous vacant buildings.
Ever since he moved into his home on Hatch Street in Syracuse 5 years ago, George Horne says it’s been a constant battle with City Hall over abandoned buildings on his street. “You call city line and you have to make repeated phone calls to get them down here.”, Horne complained.
Recently the front porch on one of the homes collapsed. Though city crews cleared the dangerous debris from the yard the next day, Horne called CNY Central’s Jim Kenyon to look into the way Syracuse handles vacant structures. It turns out, the city is revamping the process according to Neighborhood Development Commissioner Paul Driscoll, “What we’ve instituted lately is a more robust grading system for all these vacant structures.”
Driscoll says inspectors now check all 19-hundred vacant buildings at least once every three weeks. He says each is placed in one of five categories with the worst slated for demolition based on their danger to the public. Driscoll says the five abandoned homes on Hatch Street have been classified as “fair” meaning they’re not yet ready for demolition.
Last year, after Kenyon reported on the vacant home problem in Syracuse, Mayor Stephanie Miner increased the demolition budget to $1 million. Driscoll says he’s lobbying for another million for next year. The average cost to tear down a building is around $20 thousand, according to Driscoll. He says the city has stepped up its negotiations with insurance companies and property owners to reimburse the city for demolition costs. “Unfortunately that’s fairly rare to be reimbursed through an insurance company. ” he said.
The Nieghborhood Development Commissioner says he’s restructuring the bidding process by which the city hires a contractor to take down a building to, among other things, allow for deconstruction. “Deconstruction is a method of taking apart a house and reusing many of the components. It’s much more labor intensive but it’s also greener and provides more job opportunities.” Driscoll claims.
Driscoll is also proposing to use part of the city’s demolition budget to target specific neighborhoods where abandoned houses threaten to bring down property values for everyone.
He’s is considering a plan by which a building can be moved higher on the demolition priority list if a neighbor offers to buy the empty lot. He says that will remove the taxpayer expense of having to maintain the lot.
via Syracuse revamps vacant building demolition process : News : CNYcentral.com.