Recently one morning I was at an Upper East Side building taking measurements for a Local Law 11/98 repair program. As I was walking down the fire escape from the fourth floor, one of the metal steps broke off and fell to the landing below. Fortunately I was holding on to the railings with both [...]
One of the more frequent assignments we get at Rand is figuring out how to stop leaks in buildings. Once water enters through the roof or facade, it can travel far and wide, making it difficult to find the source and determine the extent of deterioration. To better arm us in that never-ending battle, we've [...]
In October of 1987, a handful of RAND Engineering, PC employees (we hadn't added the "& Architecture" part yet) set up shop on the 12th floor in a drab building in what was then a sketchy part of Chelsea, on 25th Street near Seventh Avenue. The building lacked amenities, the street lacked safety, and the [...]
Recently at a residential co-op in Upper Manhattan, Rand administered the installation of three new gas absorption chillers and two new boilers that required some tricky maneuvering. The new 60-ton-capacity chillers (each weighing 5,310 pounds) and boilers (1,025 pounds) are factory built and could not be assembled in place. Instead, each chiller and boiler had [...]
As you wend your way through the streets of New York, especially in Manhattan, you can’t avoid walking under or around construction sheds, those ubiquitous steel-and-plywood structures covering large tracts of the city’s sidewalks. Just how ubiquitous are they? According to the Buildings Departments, there are approximately 6,000 sidewalk sheds in New York City, covering [...]
Rand recently received an award for Environmental Stewardship from the New York Association of Realty Managers, which has us basking in a warm, green glow. We're glad to see how the real estate industry has embraced the importance of making buildings more energy efficient and environmentally friendly, and we're honored that our peers have recognized [...]
The amount of information an owner, agent, or engineer/architect may need to know about a building can be extensive. Fortunately a number of websites and online databases makes it much easier to find property data than it was just a few years ago. For instance, to find a building's block and lot number you once had [...]
February is right around the corner, and in addition to Groundhog's Day, Valentine's Day, President's Day, and this year, Leap Day, add one more date to the calendar: February 21. That's the day of the first filing deadline for the 7th Cycle of Local Law 11/98 (now known as the Facade Inspection and Safety Program, [...]
New York City has nearly one million buildings (975,000 by the DOB’s count), many of them prewar constructions with historic features that require regular maintenance and repair to guard against the ravages of time and weather. Yet for New York City teens and young adults, there are few opportunities to learn the skills necessary for [...]
Rand was recently hired to oversee an exterior restoration and roof replacement program at 901 Broadway, which the New York Observer called “one of the most architecturally unique buildings still standing in Manhattan.” Built in 1870, the five-story building—the first iron-framed building in New York City—has an ornate cast-iron facade, a turret, and a slate [...]