New city bylaw, wind warning system help boost safety
Proposed bylaw to mandate regular maintenance of local buildings
On a warm spring day, a downtown office worker dialed 911 after he gazed out his window and noticed something unusual at the occupied office building across the street — a wall of the six- storey structure was arching and bricks were plummeting to the ground.
“It’s not a call we get every day,” said Calgary Fire Department spokeswoman Carol Henke.
“It was unusual in the sense that you don’t expect a building that’s occupied and has people working in it to bow out, and start losing pieces, and put people at risk.”
The sudden wall collapse last year underscored the need for proactive rules regarding building maintenance in Calgary.
Now, more than a year after the aging downtown structure began shedding bricks, the city is poised to unveil a new bylaw to prevent similar incidents.
The Building Maintenance Bylaw, which is scheduled to be presented to Calgary city council this fall, will mandate regular maintenance of building envelopes five stories or taller.
“The forefront thought is public safety,” said Marco Civitarese, the city’s chief building official. “Calgary is a mature city. It’s time for this to happen.”
Similar bylaws concerning the exterior of buildings exist in Vancouver and Montreal, said Civitarese, who noted Calgary’s version has been in the works for some time.
The city began officially working on the bylaw in late 2014, a few months after bricks plummeted from the crumbling 56- year- old downtown Genco building in May 2014.
Although no one was injured, the falling debris crushed cars parked below, triggering streets closures and the evacuation of more than 150 people from 12 businesses in the building at 608 7th street S. W.
Crews spent days evaluating the building and eventually weeks disassembling the wall, brick by brick.
“It was timely ( the Genco incident) came up, but it was certainly on the work plan to get this ( bylaw) done. It was in the wheelhouse before,” Civitarese said.
A violent windstorm in November 2011 that toppled trees, downed power lines and closed part of the city’s core after pieces of roofing from downtown buildings were tossed to the ground, highlighted the need for new rules, Civitarese said.
More recently, as creation of the bylaw was underway, two chunks of sandstone fell from the historic Fairmont Palliser building in June, an incident that led to street and sidewalk closures.
Eight reports of materials falling from existing structures were made to 311 in the first six months of 2015, compared to zero in the same time period in 2014, and the increasing number of incidents is a “significant concern” to city staff.
The yet- to- be unveiled bylaw is about turning away from the city’s existing reactive approach to building maintenance, where buildings are maintained once problems show up.
Instead, Civitarese said the building maintenance bylaw embraces a proactive approach that will mitigate the risk of falling material and debris — something the city has already done with buildings that are under construction.
“It will be an audit, if you will,” he said.
As buildings age, or are hit by extreme weather incidents like the 2013 flood, the need to ensure the structures are safe increases, Civitarese said.
The bylaw has undergone consultation and is currently being refined before it’s scheduled to be presented to the planning and urban development committee this fall.
“We’ve been involved with numerous industry stakeholders, we’ve got all sorts of envelope specialists, engineers, consultants in the room with us looking at these things,” Civitarese said.
Lloyd Suchet, executive director at the Building Owners and Managers Association ( BOMA) Calgary, said his organization has been consulted throughout the bylaw’s development.
“Certainly, focusing on safety for the city is always a good thing,” he said.
Suchet is hopeful the finished bylaw will protect public safety without creating unnecessary red tape, or costs for landlords.
“Not all commercial buildings are going to have the same resources,” he said.
“It’s about reaching that balance of achieving safety but not becoming overly burdensome on the landlords ... we’re confident the final product will reach that balance.”