Council approves fire hall repairs
Emergency structural repairs to fix an overloaded concrete floor in the truck bay of King Street fire hall will be carried out after council passed a staff report during its committee meeting Tuesday night.
The report from facilities manager James O’Neill called for the city to budget a maximum of $65,000 for the emergency repairs.
“I’m pleased to see this come forward, but not happy we have to do emergency repairs,” said Ward 2 Coun. David McLeod. “I’m glad the safety issue was recognized.”
O’Neill’s report said in August of this year an initial structural inspection of the fire hall was conducted by James Federico & Associates, a structural engineering firm, to determine the load capacity of the floor slab, and structural elements supporting the floor slab in the truck bay and basement.
The fire hall, at 636 King St., was constructed in 1939, and originally housed Crowland Town Hall and Fire Department. It became Welland Fire and Emergency Services headquarters in 2001.
“During the past several years truck size and equipment loads have increased, in both size and capacity, which puts additional stress on a structure not originally designed to support this type of loading,” O’Neill’s report said.
The report said site inspections were performed on August 15, September 12, September 21, and October 5 and included ground penetrating radar, and invasive testing to determine rebar size, type, location, and condition.
“Evidence of water leaks and cracking were evident during the inspections, and
subsequent analysis indicated this was caused by overloading of the concrete floor in the truck bay,” it said.
O’Neill’s report said a structural analysis took into account weight of the fire trucks, wheel span, and loading at the wheelbase of the vehicles. It also said if the building is to continue housing fire trucks, immediate reinforcement of the longitudinal support beams must be carried out.
“Worst case scenarios place the wheelbase at the midpoint in the horizontal structural span, directly in between support columns, which is currently inadequate to support the weight of the emergency services vehicles.”
The report said initial steps to correct the problem are to address the health and safety issues for employees, which includes preventing personnel from accessing the basement underneath the truck bay, along with limiting the number of personnel on the floor area while trucks are parked on the slab.
“Further steps include mandating that vehicles park with their wheelbase directly above lateral support beams in order to place loading on the strongest points of the structure. Emergency shoring is to be erected immediately to support the longitudinal support beams in the basement until further structural repairs are completed,” O’Neill’s report said.
During the committee meeting, McLeod asked if there were any other areas of concern in the fire hall.
Erik Nickel, Welland’s manager of engineering services, said there are a number of other less important concerns.
“The structure has some facade issues, with bricks loosening themselves and coming off,” said Nickel.
He said there also issues with staircases and storage areas, but the immediate concern is the structural issues.
“We’re hoping those repairs buy us some more time in that facility, it still needs to remain active.” Nickel said city staff would keep an eye on the other issues and make repairs as needed.