The city Department of Buildings issued a partial stop-work order on a Midtown high-rise after finding an issue with the building’s support columns — a discovery made just weeks after buckling steel columns nearly led to the collapse of an E. 42nd St. building, officials said Wednesday.
The partial shutdown for 750 Third Ave. near E. 47th St. was issued Tuesday after building inspectors found welding splices on the reinforcements of several steel columns that were not included in approved building plans, according to a DOB spokesman.
The partial stop-work order was issued after a contractor could not produce documentation for the welding splices on site, a DOB spokesman said. Inspectors did not find any damage, cracking, or structural distress related to the unapproved welds.
Just like the property on 235 E. 42nd St., which once housed the offices for Pfizer, the developer at 750 Third Ave. is converting the 35-story office building into about 600 new apartments. Amenities for the new residential building will include a party room, sundeck and screening room, according to the Wall Street Journal.
The 235 E. 42nd St. project is the largest such office-to-residential space conversion in city history and is slated to create 1,602 new apartments, officials said.
On July 7, 235 E. 42nd St. was evacuated after steel support beams began to buckle and bend, leading to fears of collapse. The FDNY and DOB evacuated several buildings and streets as they shored up the building. Everything was reopened on Friday after the DOB determined there was no ongoing structural danger to the building.
The E. 42nd St. building is just six blocks from 750 Third Ave., officials said.
The Third Ave. property is the third high-rise conversion project in Manhattan that’s been hit with partial stop-work orders following the near collapse at the old Pfizer building, according to a NY Times report. While inspectors didn’t find any issues to the degree of what they found on E. 42nd St., they discovered discrepancies with project permits and paperwork, officials said.
The other conversions, including 222 Broadway and 77 Water St., were issued partial stop-work orders following inspections on July 11, the DOB said.
In the case of 222 Broadway, inspectors found that plans for repairs to two cracked concrete columns were not properly filed or approved. The stop-work order was issued on July 23 as the city waited for delivery of engineering documentation to prove it was safe for work to proceed. That documentation was sent the following day and is currently under review, according to the DOB.
At 77 Water St., inspectors issued multiple partial stop-work orders in response to various violations, including improper use of a scissor lift, an unpermitted support scaffold, and a lack of fireguards on site during welding and other “hot” work, the DOB spokesman said.
Following the incident at the Pfizer building, the DOB initiated a proactive inspection sweep of construction sites throughout the city. It is unclear whether the conversion projects that were forced to stop work were caught up in the sweep.