urbanSTL

Time to add more floors.

Alex Ihnen wrote:Obviously the primary concern is for the residents of the building, first and foremost. I do assume that it will be rebuilt.

Yes, of course. Didnt mean to come off insensitive.

there is no guarantee that it will be rebuilt as apartments or even rebuilt at all
but now there is a spot for that cvs and it will be adjacent to walgreens
(walgreens close to cvs is common around the country)

Wow. Weird. Brings back memories of the under-construction-arsons we had a few years ago.

According to the fire department, the building did not have fire stops in the attic. An open plan attic on a platform-framed building that large is reckless and indicates cheap construction standards. (The building always looked cheaply-built to me.) Should our building code allow another building like this to be built? I think not.

Glad no one was hurt.

“This is light weight construction. It doesn't hold up like some of the older buildings , that's why it burns so quick. Light weight construction burns so fast.” said Chief Jenkerson.

Guess those old buildings aren't so bad after all?

I used to live in one of the big buildings on Union and loved that it was concrete floors and plaster walls mainly for its noise-blocking property. Of course good for fires too. Egressing might have been a challenge. It had fire escapes but there weren't two options for every apt.

Is it safe to assume the garage didn't burn down?

Perhaps the fact that they could sign CVS as an anchor tenant could mean a faster turn around on reconstruction. Although CVS might prefer to go their own way and just move forward on plans for the AAA site.

I hope someone checks the new apt building on Grand that also had a fire during construction. Also check the new apt buildings at Hanley and Strassner. I remember seeing lots of wood for that one.

If I was the insurer of 3949 I'd be going ape sh*t from what I'm hearing.

Funny how cars get concrete, while the residences don't. How much of the $30M for 3949 was the parking garage?

quincunx wrote:If I was the insurer of 3949 I'd be going ape sh*t from what I'm hearing.

The insurer took the risk knowing how the building was constructed. Presumably the premium reflected that, but who knows.

This is a great example of why not to use wood framing for a building of this size. I watched this building get built twice while I was a student at SLU, and while I thought they were crazy for using wood in a building this size (pre-manufactured sections for speed), I assumed there had at least been rated drywall fire breaks built into the structure. Clearly this was not the case in the attic, and that is ludicrous to me. I'd hate to be the architect on this one.

Crazy! I was at Arby's around 6:30 or 645 and they're saying the fire started around 7. I haven't had a chance to drive by and check out the damage. I hope they rebuild residential. What was the occupancy percentage? That restaurant/bar just opened up there too: I've only been once and don't remember the name. Seems like things were just getting going there.

Although smaller, the new Salvation Army building was built the same way.

^ I Gumbo.

Fire Department is reporting that walls to code were in the attic, but the fire was too strong. In a sense, that is good to hear, but makes me think maybe better walls are needed. Can't design for everything, though.

To Alex's point that the fire didn't burn all the way down (though we can't really see how far down burned), the water damage alone has to be so extensive that it's cheaper to tear down and start over. Having experience with a similar fire on a much smaller scale, this was the case.

That is amazing how the fire appeared to be confined to the roof, attic, and top floor, yet the building is a total loss since the fire spread so quickly and completely.

I suppose like Alex said, the north half of the building is a loss as well due to smoke and water damage.

While I'd hope for another dense development to take its place, or even for the building to be rebuilt as it was, why do I get the feeling the owners will simply sell to CVS and we'll get stuck with a basic store, a parking lot, and a Garage to Nowhere?

My worry here is that the quoted construction cost of the building was $30 million, yet it recently sold for $28 million, and some people were surprised by how high the sale price actually was. Also the property had to deeply discount rents from its initial market rents to fill the building up.

So I hope with the garage still standing and insurance money, they can make this work.

According to the latest P-D article, the building was to code, but the code might be ineffective on this point:

[Fire Chief] Jenkerson initially also complained that the building lacked attic partitions required by code that are supposed to stop or slow the spread of a fire. The chief retracted that statement after firefighters discovered that barriers called draft stops were in place, as required.

But the draft stops — made from single sheets of drywall, according to Jenkerson — weren't very effective.

Current plans are to rebuild:

The building's owner, EdR Collegiate Housing of Memphis, Tenn., said Thursday it will rebuild the complex. The four-story structure had contained 256 beds in studio, one- and two-bedroom apartments. The company did not give a timetable for reconstruction. EdR bought the complex in January for nearly $28.5 million.

When the decisions were made by municipalities to allow developers to replace masonry and concrete with a solid fuel as the primary structural material in residential and small commercial construction, what exactly were the expected consequences? And single-layer sheetrock fire breaks - really???

It's astounding that insurers, who have such a huge amount of exposure to losses such as this, would cover this type of construction. In addition to the materials issue, were there not adequate fire-supression systems; i.e. sprinklers, etc. installed?

One has to wonder whether new residential construction could even occur in the city if masonry or steel construction were mandated for say, residential buildings greater than two stories or that have more than six units. I have seen plenty of new masonry (i.e. concrete block with single-layer brick veneer) residential construction be built in Chicago; the economics of it must work there. Why does the City of St. Louis believe that construction techniques that are arguably appropriate in less-dense St. Charles County are appropriate here? The city used to mandate masonry construction - and it was for a reason.

I would really like to know whether masonry can be built economically in St. Louis, or if the returns from rents here are simply too low to recover the added initial costs. I hope that the adaptive reuse conversions of older commercial and industrial buildings in St. Louis continues - they seem to provide the ideal combination of solid construction and economic benefit. Anyone out there have knowledge they can share regarding the economics of construction techniques in the context of the St. Louis market? Info would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

Looks like they started with the demo last week and have been making good progress. Have there been any updates from the owner on what they want to do after the tear down?