By Jeff Brink and Michael Bauer

Three blocks from the construction site, the DCI Engineers’ Project Manager for the 1510 Webster Street development heard an airhorn blow from his home. The sound indicated that another mass timber panel was about to fly on his Oakland, California, residential project. It was the sound of progress because, by the time the PM walked to the site 15 minutes later, there was already a few thousand square feet of Mass Plywood Panel (MPP) deck in place.

By Robert K. Dowell, Gulen Ozkula, Jui-Liang Lin, Tunc Deniz Uludag, and Ayse Hortacsu

A team of structural engineers investigated the aftermath of the Mw 7.8 and Mw 7.5 Türkiye (Turkey) earthquakes of February 6, 2023.

By Eytan Solomon P. E., LEED AP, and Richard Lo P. E.

Powerhouse Arts in Brooklyn, New York is a $180 million adaptive reuse project that included extensive renovation and new construction—culminating in 170,000 square feet for fabrication shops, educational facilities, community programs, and multi-functional event space. The project entailed repairing the 55,000 square-foot original steel-and-masonry Turbine Hall, adding a new 3-story, 40,000 square-foot infill structure of cast-in-place concrete within the Turbine Hall volume, and adding a new 6-story 75,000 square-foot Boiler House structure of cast-in-place concrete; all three structures are seismically connected. This article focuses on the history and process of justifying reuse of existing foundations at the site, which was critical to the project.

By Zack Kardon P.E. and Viral Vithalani, AIA

After more than three decades of disuse, the Tapscott Building, one of the oldest edifices in the northern part of Downtown Oakland, California, known as Uptown, has a new lease on life. The steel and concrete structure built by local developer Ernest N. Tapscott opened in 1922 and featured four stories plus a basement that housed offices, shops, and a theater. Located at the corner of 19th Street and the city’s bustling Broadway corridor, the brick-clad Beaux-Arts building attracted tenants like Standard Oil Company and a public market. Over the years, tenants ranged from Kaiser Permanente to a morgue. In 1989, the Loma Prieta earthquake struck and severely damaged the Tapscott. Demolition of the rear part of the compromised theater left a seismically unsafe L-shaped building with an irregular and highly torsional structure. The Tapscott Building sat red-tagged and lifeless for 30 years.