Department of Buildings issues vacate orders at 3 more New York City parking garages
NEW YORK -- Three more parking garages in New York City have been ordered to vacate as the Department of Buildings continues inspections in the wake of April's deadly parking garage collapse.
One of the garages -- a five-story commercial parking garage at 228 E. 9th St. in the East Village -- is operated by the same company that operated the garage that collapsed at 57 Ann St. The DOB says a full vacate order was issued after engineers found cracked concrete, exposed steel reinforcement beams and cracks inside the elevator shaft.
Partial vacate orders have been issued at two other garages -- a parking structure inside a six-story mixed-used office building at 1368 Fulton St. in Brooklyn, and a parking structure in the cellar and subcellar of an 11-story mixed-use residential building at 148 Madison St. on the Lower East Side.
The DOB says the partial vacate order affects about 800 square feet inside the Brooklyn garage where there was spalling concrete on the ceiling, exposed steel reinforcement beats that showed signs of corrosion, missing mortar and plumbing leaks. The rest of the building can remain occupied.
At the Lower East Side garage, engineers found spalling concrete slabs and cracks. They also found the garage was over capacity by more than double the amount of vehicles allowed inside. The property owners were told to remove the additional vehicles and vacate the area directly underneath the spalling concrete.
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These three garages were among the 78 targeted by the DOB as they conducted citywide inspections after one person was killed when a parking garage in the Financial District collapsed on April 19.
The DOB said in a statement:
"The Department of Buildings is taking swift and sustained action to keep New Yorkers safe and hold building owners accountable. Our structural engineers are continuing their work to assess and review inspection findings of parking structures around the City, as part of our targeted enforcement sweeps of parking structures. As a result of this ongoing process, DOB has issued three additional vacate orders, where unsafe conditions necessitated parts of the buildings to be vacated. These actions were taken in the interest of public safety, until such time as these building owners can make the necessary repairs."
Vacate orders were issued at four other garages on April 28.
The DOB is continuing to review parking structures throughout the city.