329 MacDonough's Long Road to Salvation
The plight of 329 MacDonough Street (shown above last month) received a lot of ink here and elsewhere in the aftermath of a construction incident that threatened the structural integrity of the brownstone and its neighbor. When contractors dug a trench in the cellar that destabilized the party wall, the DOB was quick to call…
The plight of 329 MacDonough Street (shown above last month) received a lot of ink here and elsewhere in the aftermath of a construction incident that threatened the structural integrity of the brownstone and its neighbor. When contractors dug a trench in the cellar that destabilized the party wall, the DOB was quick to call for the two buildings’ demolition. Our concern was public safety. said Tim Lynch, the Buildings inspector who made the initial call. You cannot endanger workers. As a NY Times article this morning explores, Mr. Lynch is not a cold-hearted philistine–he had spent fourteen years of his career working for an engineering company that specializes in preservation. In the wake of his initial call, though. Mr. Lynch received praise for keeping an open mind as the owner and other preservationists worked with other engineers to come up with a proposal to save the buildings. The plan was a long shot, thought Lynch, but he decided to give it a try. It was one of the most complicated engineering plans I’ve worked on, said Mr. Lynch. The stabilization effort ended up taking 42 days, using 36 tons of concrete and more than half a mile of lumber in the process. And the homeowner, who is also likely to receive fines along with the contractor for the illegal work that caused the initial problems, is out an extra several hundred thousand dollars.
After Fight, a Brooklyn Brownstone’s Costly Rescue [NY Times]
Learning from the MacDonough Street Crisis [Brownstoner]
MacDonough St. Houses Report [Brownstoner]
Update on MacDonough Street [Brownstoner]
Salvation on MacDonough Street? [Brownstoner]
Stay of Execution on MacDonough Street [Brownstoner]
MacDonough Street Update 1/25/10 [Brownstoner]
Wall Collapse, Vacate Order, Maybe Demo on MacDonough [Brownstoner]
Bob Marvin gets it. Like I said, it may be too nuanced for some.
wber, you are mistaken and obviously know very little.
As I said in a post yesterday (and the Times article made clear), Lynch is a professional who knows historic buildings, why they stand up and why they fall down. He wasn’t “wrong in the first place” to order demolition – he was making a life safety decision based on the condition of the building. In most cases, the owner (or the owner’s insurance company) is not going to pony up money to save a building, and Tim’s professional judgement was that if the building was not taken down, it and three or four other buildings would come down in very short order. He was probably right in that judgement.
Tim would be the first to tell you that just about any building in any condition can be saved, but usually that takes a lot of time (to sort out the finger pointing) and a lot of money. In this case, preservationists stepped in and saved the day, and because there was a cooperative owner with a lot of money, the building could be saved.
It is great that the two buildings were saved before they endangered even more buildings. Like I said, that happened because preservationists forced the issue. It also happened because Tim Lynch was the chief engineer at DOB – most other engineers in that position would not have had the expertise to evaluate the fix proposed and see that it had a chance of working. That combination of circumstances – along with the owner’s deep pockets – does not come along very often. And that is unfortunate.
It may too nuanced for some, but this is a case where both sides were right.
People don’t use architects or engineers because they want to spend the money they save on stuff for themselves – better appliances, furnishings, etc. Then they ask the contractor to dig out the cellar a little bit so they can put a gym down there. The contractor who doesn’t know what he doesn’t know, says “Sure, I’ll do that for $****”. (Underpinning, we don’t need no stinking underpinning). The workers start digging and knowing even less than their boss….you get situations like McDonough.
This has nothing to do with construction but in Bunraku (Japanese puppetry), one apprentices for ten years on the left leg, then another ten years on the right leg and the left arm; and then after twenty years one finally gets to the right arm and the head. I’d settle for a contractor who does the right leg and the left arm.
We probably shouldn’t have demonized Mr Lynch. He may well have been following rigid DOB procedure from which he couldn’t deviate. Given his previous experience, I think it was quite possible that the reaction of the preservation community and the court’s action might have given Lynch the opportunity to follow his best instincts. Any fault for the hasty demolition order might well be blamed on DOB management, rather than their engineer in the field.
I’ve had no experience with DOB, but as a retired City manager, I’ve seen lots of rigidity at high levels.
benson- really you are so irrational on this subject it hardly pays to read them. If anyone loves slinging invective, and shrieking good vs evil, it’s certainly you. Maybe you don’t care about people losing the homes, and could care less, especially if they love old buildings.
But facts is facts- he took a 5 minute gander and blithely ordered the destruction of up to 4 homes. Without blinking. Just because he is a DOB engineer, doesn’t make him infallible. And the proof is other engineers disagreed with him and the buildings are being repaired and still standing. It was a win win all around. So what bothers you so much about it? Someone questioned authority and won?
Old houses were saved? The old lady in the house next door got to keep her beloved home? Really- what the hell is your problem?
I may use the phrase “road to Damascus moment” in the future.
Love that.
Given the way Mr. Lynch is now being portrayed as opposed to one or two comments originally from people who have had actual dealings with him, I’d bet dollars to donuts that his ego needed to be carefuly tip-toed around. Typical beaureacrat.
Benson, I stand by my comments. Just because we “know” him better through this piece in the paper does not mean he wasn’t wrong in the first place. He did roll in and condemn the place in a very short amount of time and with a cursory inspection. That’s just a fact.
Minard is right, had the homeowners and community not acted as they did, he wouldn’t even be the “hero” of this piece, because the buildings, probably at least 3 or 4 of them, would be nothing but a memory, and he’d be moving on to the next emergency. The fact that they are not, is not because of Mr. Lynch, but in spite of him. It is admirable that he changed his mind, and joined in the engineering effort to fix the damage, I’m glad he had a road to Damascus momement and saw the light. But let’s give credit where credit is due; the engineers enlisted by the preservation movement, particularly the Landmarks Conservancy, played a huge role in convincing the judge to issue a stay of execution.