Monday, April 28, 2014

Get out while you can!

From the Queens Chronicle:

Two weeks ago, a worried construction manager hurried a reporter and a frustrated building superintendent out of a vacated fifth-floor apartment because of newly formed cracks threatening the structural integrity of the structure’s facade.

While 19 tenants still don’t know when they can return to their residences, work has begun to shore up the fracture-laden apartment building at 94-01 64 Road in Rego Park damaged by excavation work at the next-door lot.

Emergency external shoring work was approved by the Department of Buildings last Thursday for the cracking structure, temporarily easing the worries over whether at least part of the building could collapse in the coming weeks.

“The bottom line is that work has started,” Mike Santoro, Samson Management’s director of construction management, said. “But we have to continue monitoring what they are doing.”

Booth Holdings LLC, the owner of the excavation site in question, has been tasked with installing the external bracing and shoring on the neighboring building.

While Santoro is pleased that work has begun to save the cracking structure, he has his suspicions over Booth Holdings’ ability to properly secure the building.

By Feb. 26, the cracks were getting to be so bad that a resident called 911. After the FDNY and the DOB surveyed the building, it was determined that six apartments, including that of the building’s superintendent, were unsafe to occupy.

Since the partial vacate order was issued, the cracks have seemingly gotten worse, spreading to the roof of the building and getting large enough for daylight to stream through the concrete in the basement.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Another job by Scarano.

Anonymous said...

This does not look good. The city should evacuate the entire building.

Anonymous said...

I hope that Booth Holdings LLC is paying their hotel bills and will be required to find them similarly -sized and priced replacement apartments.

This is outrageous! That company's license should be revoked - and the demo team and the architects involved.

A lot of these demolition people seem like a bunch or knuckle-walking retards - no offense to gorillas or the mentally-challenged.

Anonymous said...

How do they manage to graduate architecture school? Seems like an AIA membership isn't worth much either.