31 Brooklyn condo residents reach $235,000 settlement.

A group of owners in a Williamsburg condominium complex, The Williamsburg Mews, are to receive $235,000 after settling a lawsuit with its developer, architect and contractors.

Condo owners settle with developers. By Elizabeth Stull of the Brooklyn Daily Eagle

Crack on Crack Action

1504 8th Avenue has new cracks as of today. Some "before and after" shots for the folks at the Department of Buildings.



April 29th, 2007

























May 18th, 2007























Detail of the parapet wall. Yep, that's new.

Natural Sound

Almost every morning as the sunlight pours over the Armory's crenelated parapet walls, way before the 7am permitted NYC construction start-time, before the tractor-trailer dump trucks can cue up, before the jack hammers start a hammerin', even before the gas powered generators are switched on to power the welders arc, there is the powerful sound of a single wood pecker pecking, identity unknown, working in the gigantic oak a few yards down. I believe it's a woodpecker. The rapid pounding sound is very convincing. It could also be one of many Mocking birds in the area who have taken to imitating the beep, beep, beep, sound that a truck makes when it backs up. In any case this is one excavation related sound I honestly enjoy waking to.

Department of Buildings Special Investigation Unit said "No Danger"

"No danger to adjoining properties"























On April 23rd, just one month after the Internal Affairs investigation was completed, 1504 8th Avenue took a turn for the worse. Over night new cracks formed and the existing cracks widened causing the Department of Buildings to issue a new Stop Work Order and to impose a forced evacuation of The Memorial Baptist Church's parking lot. What happened? Why was the excavation allowed to continue before 1504 8th Avenue had been stabilized and steel bracing installed? How could it even be possible to stabilize and underpin the damaged buildings rear foundation wall if the surrounding soil has been disturbed to the depth of some 60 feet? Surely the entire rear foundation wall is no longer resting peacefully on solid ground. Why no additional steel bracing on the damaged rear facade? There are at least a dozen cracks between the many windows.

Certainly the people living in the attached building at 1502 8th Avenue deserve some reassurance that someone is looking out for their well being. I don't think I could continue to live just 10 feet from the precipice knowing my life rested in the hands of the Armory Plaza Gang. The Partial or let's say Half Assed Stop Work Order barely in place for a week would have been a good time to reflect on every one's future. I am not sure if these IAD investigations are part of the public domain, but I think the information would be helpful in understanding what went wrong. Are the engineering conditions at this site so unpredictable that no one can really know for sure what's what? In this case we are being told to rest assured that 1504 is being monitored, yet its safety is now and has always been in doubt. No tiny plastic crack monitor will change my mind. We should hope that the investigation would be reopened.

Safe and Sound?

Looking back it's actually a good thing that the investigation completed March 23rd didn't include a thorough examination of the surrounding properties . From what I have been told, no one ever looked at the recent cracks inside the Memorial Baptist Church. No one attached to this special investigation unit, to my knowledge, ever came by any of the properties along the rear 16th Street side of the excavation line to check on the cracks or sink holes. In a vindicating way, it may be better to have been overlooked and ignored than to have been inspected and told that there is no reality to your complaints, or worse, that the damage existed long before the construction began.
There exists a well documented history of 311 complaints on the Departments own BIS web page with home owners questioning the safety of the foundation work and its impact on their adjoining buildings. This would have been a good place to start looking. Maybe the inspectors could have stopped by to watch the videos and have a peek at the before and after photos.

ECB

Wouldn't it be nice if there was some kind of government agency in NYC, with the power to impose monetary fines on developers and their contractors when they have been caught breaking the rules?

You would think that might act as an effective deterrent; An incentive for everyone to do the right thing. It should work... Except when all their fines are dismissed as in the case of the Armory Plaza. In that instance I don't really see the point in bothering. If I was an inspector it would be disheartening to see all my hard work routinely ignored.












Description of Violation:
FAILURE TO SAFEGUARD PUBLIC & PROPERTY AFFECTED BY CONST OPERATIONS UN
DER APPLI #301987161 EXP 11/1/06. NOTED: DURING DRIVE PILING PHASE OF
EXCAVATION AROUND THE PROPERTY LINE OF 406 15 ST.THE REAR YARD PORTION

Description of Violation:
FAILURE TO SAFEGUARD PUBIC & PROPERTY AFFECTED BY CONSTRUCTION OPERATI
ONS UNDER APPL. #301987161-01 NB: NOTED: CONSTR. OPERATIONS W/EXCAVATI
ON APPROX. 5 FT DEEP EXPOSED APPROX. 48 OF TREE ROOTS AT ADJ. REAR YD


Description of Violation:
FAILURE TO COMPLY WITH STOP WORK ORDER. NOTED: WORK ONGOING UNDER APPL
. #301987161 N.B., INSTALLATION OF METAL PILES CONTRARY TO STOP WORK O
RDER #111605ZR0706BR ISSUED FOR ZONING CHANGES. STOP ALL IMMEDIATELY


Description of Violation:
FAILURE TO COMPLY WITH STOP WORK ORDER. NOTED: WORK ONGOING APP #30198
7161 NB INSTALLATION OF METAL PILES COHTRORY TO STOP WORK ORDER #11160
5ZR0706BR ISSUED ON 11-16-05 FOR ZONING CHANGES. STOP ALL WORK IMMEDIA

Pool

Unearthed erratics deposited by the Wisconsin Glacier.

South Slope "Terroir"

South Slope Excavation Continues

The foundation wall directly below 1504 8th Avenue. You can see the bracing in place on the building's side wall. Interestingly, there has been no bracing on the rear facade which has quite a bit of masonry cracking between windows. For a sense of scale you can use the wood construction fence. Each sheet of plywood is 4' x 8' in size.


























Rear lot line wall. The SE corner directly behind the Memorial Baptist Church.



















Looks like they have reached the bottom. Looking at the SW corner directly below 389 16th Street. Despite being relatively dry these past weeks, water has been seeping through the foundation piles forming a pool. This week, however, rain has been predicted for Thursday through Sunday. Expect more sink holes and cracking to follow.

sunrise brooklyn 5:30am

Work

That was fast.

Complaint Disposition History

FULL RESCIND OF STOP WORK ORDER 05/02/2007


"ALL WORK UNDER NB APPL TO CONTINUE UNDER CONTROLED INSPECTONS LL BE PLACED TO 10FT BELOW GRADE"

DIY

Corrections?
Recently workers started filling the new sink holes along the fence line. Standing way up high on the concrete piling cap, a worker lowers a bucket down into the pit where another fills it with dirt. It's then hoisted up by hand and poured over the fence to fill in the areas where the ground continues to settle. This is still trespassing. It is not "repairs" or "improvements". The owner of 391 16th Street has told them not to fill in anything, but they always seem to return. If it wasn't so futile, I would find the DIY attempt at stopping the settling using a five gallon bucket amusing, especially in contrast to the vastness of the work going on in the back ground.

Spencer St. Condos still in Limbo Land.

"Builders Gone Wild"
Barbara Nevins Taylor from My9News investigates Mendel Brach and the Certificate of Occupancy "problems" at his shadey over-built Spencer Street Condos in Bed Stuy, Brooklyn. Sorry, no mention of our friend Henry Radusky and Bricolaged Designs.

Today from The Pit

Rear wall of The Pit with bracing.






















Looking East. Yellow caution tape marks the "Forbidden Zone"

1504 8th Avenue: Braced and Stabilized

Good as new?

Brennan's Legislative Package

Brennan Announces Legislative Package to Address Shortcomings in Regulation of Construction and Development in New York City.

Assemblymember James Brennan (D-Brooklyn), Chair of the Cities Committee, has introduced a package of legislation designed to address shortcomings in the regulation of construction and development in New York City, following public hearings held in September and November 2006 by the State Assembly’s Standing Committees on Cities, Housing and Codes. This legislation is being introduced at the State level because the health and safety of the population of NYC is a matter of important State concern.

Brennan’s legislation will tighten enforcement of the NYC Building Code and Zoning Resolution during one of the largest and longest building booms in New York City’s history, with residential building permits surging from 5,135 in 1995 to 15,050 in 2000 to 31,600 in 2006. While the current real estate boom provides much-needed housing stock and construction jobs, the enormous profits to be made in the real estate market are a powerful incentive to build quickly and large – leading some to skirt the laws that guarantee safe and sound construction and appropriate neighborhood density through zoning protection.

A 2004 New York City Comptroller’s audit found that 51% of sampled building violations in 2002 were issued for hazardous violations and that there was no systematic Department of Buildings (DOB) process for following up on hazardous violations. OSHA reported 80 deaths from New York City construction accidents between 2002 and 2005. A 2002 review by the NY Trial Lawyers Institute of 2,500 OSHA construction-site inspections found one or more serious safety violations at 2/3 of the sites. A 2003 NYC Comptroller’s audit found errors in 67% of sampled self-certified construction plans. And in 2005, the DOB’s own mandated audits of a fifth of all self-certified plans found 16% of them contained such serious errors that building permits had to be revoked.

The legislative package includes the following seven bills:


• A7745(Brennan)/S5422(Padavan), The Department of Buildings Community Accountability Act, directs DOB to notify community boards and borough presidents of all construction permits and DOB actions in the district; requires DOB to file public reports on all construction accidents, property damage and dangerous buildings conditions resulting from building code violations; prohibits issuance of certificates of occupancy until all adjudicated fines and penalties are paid; and gives community boards the right to request 30 DOB audits annually and receive copies of any requested plans within 5 days.

• A7800(Brennan)/S5223(Padavan), requires timely re-inspection and correction of all hazardous building violations issued by the DOB.

• A7755(Hevesi)/S5407(Padavan), converts into tax liens any unpaid, adjudicated fines levied for hazardous building violations.

• A7746(Brennan)/S4603(Padavan), gives the DOB the power to refuse to accept the filing of any documents by a person who, following a hearing, has been found to have knowingly or negligently submitted false documents to the Department of Buildings, thus expanding the Department’s arsenal for curbing abuse of self-certification privileges. This bill is supported by the office of the Mayor.

• A7744(Brennan)/S5410(Padavan), requires, for the first time, City licensure of general contractors by a Contractors Licensing Board, composed of 13 members appointed by the Mayor. This will allow the City to revoke the licenses of developer-contractors who are willful violators of laws involving safety, workers’ compensation, etc.

• A7748(Brennan)/S5246(Padavan), holds contractors liable for any damage caused by excavation. Currently contractors are not liable for damage to adjacent properties caused by excavation less than 10 feet in depth. This bill eliminates that exemption and in addition requires contractors to carry liability insurance to compensate neighbors for damages caused by excavation. This bill is supported by the office of the Mayor.

• A7747(Brennan)/S5441(Padavan), funds technical assistance grants of $500,000 to a not-for-profit organization in each borough to provide legal, technical and professional assistance in the public interest regarding zoning, planning, and building and construction issues.

Our Western, I mean Eastern Wall,

With the Partial Stop Work Order now in place, excavation near the 100' long Eastern wall has come to a stand still. The only contradiction is that the official SWO description specifically details the "Western" lot line as the problem, but what I think they actually intended to say is the "Eastern" side of the lot. The Brooklyn Department of Buildings have their compass directions mixed up. As you dig closer and closer to the center of the Earth, direction does starts to get a little confusing.
Regardless, there are two D.o.B. requirements of the partial SWO. The first is to back-fill the hole along the area directly behind the cracked and failing 1504 8th Avenue to a depth of 10'. The photo above shows the extent of the back fill. Looks like they only got around to filling the hole to maybe 15' below grade, but who exactly is counting.
The second requirement is that they cease all work within a safety buffer zone 20' out from the wall, creating a 2000 square foot area off-limits to any further excavation. For now I guess this SWO will stay in place until 1504 can be stabilized. Permits have been posted on the front door of the damaged building, but as of today no external bracing or stabilization work has been executed.




















The Ramp
Excavating a hole this size becomes tricky. With only one way out to 15th street, you have to make sure you don't paint yourself into a corner.




















Twenty feet deep and the pilings start to wander off coarse.
It is now evident that as the boring machine went deeper the piling's alignment became less controlled. You can see at about 20' down they start to get a little funky. Some can be seen standing proud from the rest in the row. This makes it more difficult to fit the iron bracing flush against the piles.



















Which Way to the Western Front?
However, along the rear and Western lot lines, the digging has progressed downward almost to the maximum depth, where eventually, the finished 3rd subfloor foundation slab will be poured. This reinforced concrete slab is crucial as it is supposed to tie together all the foundation pilings, holding them in place. Think of it as the bottom of the box, so to speak. You can see the second level of bracing has started to be welded in place at the Southwestern corner.

Open-cut & Bottom-up Secant Walls, Brooklyn Style.

The Brooklyn Engineering Design and Build question of the day. Concerning our beloved Armory Plaza; "What is the construction sequence when building a secant piling wall foundation using the "Open-cut and Bottom-up method and how is or isn't it being applied in this specific case?" You can Email your answers to: Imby@nyc.rr.com Members of the NYC Forensic Engineering Unit of the Buildings Department are encouraged to submit their answers as well. All answers will be published at a later date.


Lesson of the day.

Using these excellent graphics, (courtesy of Singapore's Land Transport Authority L.T.A.) we can see exactly the steps involved when using the "open-cut and bottom-up" excavation techniques. Before we begin I would just like to mention that these techniques were used, for example, in the construction of Singapore's Rapid Transit Systems Northeast Line or (NEL).

"Construction of NEL spanned six years, from 1997 to 2002. During this period, LTA overcame many challenges. It constructed stations in heavily built-up areas like Chinatown, safeguarded some of Singapore's oldest buildings along Race Course Road - under which tunnelling works were carried out, and executed complex traffic diversion plans along the heavily used northeast corridor."

Sounds a little like bragging to me.

But, I'm getting ahead of myself. Please keep in mind before attempting to make any comparisons, that building a simple subway tunnel is no where near as challenging an engineering feat as say, building The Armory Plaza- a complex five story condo with parking garage in NYC. This is Brooklyn USA after all. Not some muggy provincial, backwater town in some Far Eastern corner of the equatorial third world.
Well then, let's plug in the opaque projector, take our seats and turn out those lights. Can someone get the window blinds please? Thank you Mr. Barbarino.

HINT: The six stages of construction

• Denial and isolation: "This is not happening to me."

• Anger: "How dare God do this to me."

• Bargaining: "Just let my house stand long enough to see my son graduate."

• Depression: "I can't bear to face going through this, putting my family through this."

. Anger again: "Why won't Allstate cover these damages?" "How much does the lawyer want?"

• Acceptance: Bend over and grab your ankles. "I'm ready, I don't want to struggle anymore."

Brooklyn's Back Yard

Prospect Park and the Grand Army Plaza. In my back yard.

Partial Stop Work Order for 406 15th Street... again!

DoB says, "Stay 20 feet away from her or else!" Failure to provide protection to neighboring 1504 8th Avenue during recent excavation work gets the Armory Plaza a Partial Stop Work Order gang spank. Demerara Engineering joins the kamikazi clusterfuck. Let's see how they get out of this one. Will the new foundation work be put on hold until the old foundation can be repaired?

All the kings horses-The reconstruction of 396 15th Street.

Before we pull the plug on the cracked up 1504 8th Avenue just yet, we should first take a look down the block. Witness the current efforts at resuscitating the seemingly mortally wounded, 396 15th Street. Its front and side facades severly injured during the early excavation work on the planned foundation for the neighboring 400 15th Street Condo project, 396 is in the process of removing and replacing 125 feet of its two story side wall. To anyone passing by, it may look like just another South Slope demolition in process. Everything from below the ground up has so far been removed.
Criss crossing X bracing has been welded to the existing joists in order to hold up the roof and second story floor while the side wall is replaced.

The incentive to repair 396 may come from the owners ongoing lawsuit which I am guessing prevents the developer from proceeding any further until all corrections have been made and damages repaired. For you budding engineers out there, this section of 15th Street, between 7th and 8th Avenues in Brooklyn, is a cautionary lesson on everything that can go pathetically wrong when digging near existing buildings.