Building code gets new look.New York New York, state, United States New York, Middle Atlantic state of the United States. It is bordered by Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and the Atlantic Ocean (E), New Jersey and Pennsylvania (S), Lakes Erie and Ontario and the Canadian province of City's archaic building code is under even greater scrutiny after Sept. 11. In response to this, the Department of Buildings hosted a daylong hearing last week that brought together a mixture of people demanding changes to that code. Though the recommendations ran the gamut, the one unifying message from every speaker was that the DOB DOB abbr. date of birth DOB abbreviation for date of birth; used in medical records. DOB Date of birth status quo [Latin, The existing state of things at any given date.] Status quo ante bellum means the state of things before the war. The status quo to be preserved by a preliminary injunction is the last actual, peaceable, uncontested status which preceded the pending controversy. must change. Among those who spoke during the morning session were relatives of victims, engineers, firefighters, and officials from the DOB. Most of the speakers advocated sweeping changes to the building code that--if used in future skyscrapers--could save lives during an emergency. Vincent Dunn, formerly deputy chief of the FDNY FDNY Fire Department New York (New York City, NY, USA) FDNY Fort Drum, New York (US Army) , offered several ideas on how changing the designs of high-rise buildings could ensure tenants' safety. This would entail evacuation drills within all high-rise office buildings in the city so that the fire and police departments know during an emergency how long it takes to clear everyone from the building. If building owners refuse or forget to conduct these drills, said Dunn, they should be fined. "The building code should require the use of smoke-proof stairways in high-rise office buildings. The electric wiring in elevators should also be better insulated because water run off from sprinkler systems can cause electric malfunction," he said. Dunn--like others who spoke at the hearing--wants the code to prohibit future WTC-like structures (which consisted of a hollow tube bearing wall with long truss truss, in architecture and engineering, a supporting structure or framework composed of beams, girders, or rods commonly of steel or wood lying in a single plane. floors.) One consultant who spoke at the hearing called the New York City New York City: see New York, city. New York City City (pop., 2000: 8,008,278), southeastern New York, at the mouth of the Hudson River. The largest city in the U.S. building code "30 or 40 years out of date." Irwin Fruchtman, a New York City building commissioner from 1978-83, said that after every major disaster there is inevitably a call for action. "But you must ask yourselves this question--is it sustainable, or just the normal political reaction to appease the public?" He went on to call the DOB "the most misunderstood and mishandled agency in the city...chronically used as the whipping boy whipping boy surrogate sufferer for delinquent prince. [Eur. Hist.: Brewer Note-Book, 942] See : Substitution ." His recommendations include higher standards of inspection training and the creation of a research division within the DOB to "keep up with the most important advances in building." One idea that he proposes is "safe floors" every 20 stories in a high-rise building. These floors would be protected from fire and connected to the exterior of the building via an outrigger outrigger, canoe-type vessel with a wood or bamboo float attached to the side of the craft and extending out over the water. The term outrigger also refers to the float itself. system. He also suggested "scaffold like platforms" as another measure. In closing, Fruchtman urged the DOB to learn from the past as it carries on its mission. "Remember after the 1993 World Trade Center bombing when we put an emergency bunker with a fuel bomb beneath right next to the Trade Center? We must do these things more intelligently," he said. The findings from the hearing will be presented to Mayor Michael Bloomberg by early 2003, according to the DOB. |
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