Any Progress? Yes!

Why has this blog been so quiet for so long? Not for lack of activity at Joshua Plaza...simply because of the many involvements and assorted complications that come with busy lives. Our photographer (Monroe) was on the move this fall, taking several trips to visit family and friends, and our blogger (Naomi) inconveniently came down with a prolonged case of bronchitis. But we're both back at it again, and Joshua Plaza has come a long way since the last post earlier this fall.

At church this morning, one of the praises mentioned during our sharing time was gratitude for the now-visible change to the outside of Joshua Plaza. While the masonry work on the top floor and the roof parapet was underway, the front of the building was cover by a safety netting. When the netting was removed this week, the newly power-washed edifice and the reconstructed top section sparkled—it didn't even seem to matter that the scaffolding is still in place on the street level!
While all that work was going on, there was lots of other construction and debris-removal happening as well: roofing, emptying out the basements, and an attempt to dig the elevator pit. As it turned out, the building is situated on solid rock formation, which will necessitate having the elevator stop at the ground floor rather than going down to the basement. The architect and mechanical engineer are revising the architectural drawings, which will need to be approved by the New York City Dept. of Buildings. We pray that this will not cause undue delay.

Looking down into the basement from first floor.

Major milestone

This photo documents the removal of the last piece of the original roof structure of building number 2526. This last beam was taken down this afternoon, September 19, 2008.

Masonry work begins next week. The contractor still anticipates that we will be under roof within four weeks.

Early Days

Did you know that in the early days of Seventh Avenue Mennonite Church there were two storefronts at 2526 Seventh Avenue, the first home of our congregation? The photo below was taken in 1956, shortly after services were first held there.

The photo below illustrates the construction milestone of 1960, which doubled the interior space of the church. This project involved removing the partition between the two stores and installing the brick exterior wall and more "church-like" doors and windows. Note: These photos were provided by John Kraybill, the first pastor of Seventh Avenue Mennonite Church. In the photo above he is seen standing in front of the window, wearing a traditional straight-cut suit. Other faces that some readers of this blog may be able to identify: Ethel Pannell; John Buckwalter, holding Rick (now the Chairman of the Board of Camp Deerpark); Dick Pannell; Harold Davenport; Florence Zeager; Lucy Vance. Are there other folks here that you recognize?

Beams, plywood, sand, and cement

Here's a glimpse into how building materials were delivered to our job site a couple of weeks ago. The delivery vehicle was equipped with a crane, which was used to place the exact amount of beams, plywood, sand, and cement needed on each individual floor.

This complex process, completed over two days, took only one half-day for each of the buildings.

Beams being unloaded into the third floor of 2524:

Out with the old (beams)...

...in with the new

Before new beams can be put in place, the old ones are removed and the masonry cleaned and prepared to receive the beams. Here is what it looks like before the beams are installed:


And here is what it looks like after installation:

New beam installation is the project for the week of August 25—in both buildings and for all floors. One truckload of beams was delivered last week, and another is scheduled for delivery Monday morning.

Debris removal completed in 2526!

At the start of the workweek, the center of activity moved from 2524 to 2526. The goal was to have all the debris that remained on the upper floors of the building pushed down to the first floor and completely out of the building by the end of the week. Despite the interference of several periods of delay-causing rain, that goal was met.

This is what the first floor of 2526 (looking toward the back of the building) looked like on Tuesday morning, August 12.

This is the same space on Friday, August 15. Note also that the second-floor windows are no longer boarded up and the framework has been removed.

Next up: New beams will be installed in the back section of 2526, starting on the first floor and working up.

Cut it out!

One of the unusual projects this past week was getting the old steel staircase removed from 2524. The crew arrived Wednesday afternoon to begin cutting the mass of tangled metal apart. By noon on Thursday, everything had not only been cut apart, but the pieces—five floors worth of stairway—had been carried out.

Staircases...sort of

So why is that the inspectors tend to prefer staying on the first floor? Well...it probably has something to do with the way one gets upstairs—which has nothing to do with stairs! From the first floor to the second floor of 2524, there is a ladder. To get to the third floor and above, one climbs out a second story window onto the fire escape and walks up (using the fire escape).

The only way to get access to an upper floor of 2526 is to climb the ladder from the first floor to the second in 2524, then climb out a non-fire-escaped window and walk across a three-foot-wide roof ledge between the two buildings. From there, one crawls through a window into the second floor of 2526. The fire escape is then used to proceed further "upstairs."

In the foreground of the photo below is the ladder that currently serves as the only access to the second floor of 2524 (and, technically, the only route to the second floor of 2526, as well). In the background, and in the two subsequent photos, you can see the mangled steel-frame staircase that used to run up the five stories of the building.

NYC fire inspectors come to inspect

On Wednesday, July 30, inspectors from the New York City Fire Department stopped by. Inspectors stop by frequently--often unannounced, as was the case with these gentlemen. So far, the site has been visited by inspectors from Housing Preservation and Development, the NYC Department of Transportation, the NYC Department of Buildings, and the engineer from the Community Preservation Corporation.

Often there is some trepidation on the part of the inspectors about actually going inside the buildings. Always the contractor and sub-contractor are relieved to have "Reverend Monroe" on site to answer questions, conduct "tours" (wearing his hardhat, of course), and allow them to keep focusing on their work while other matters are attended to.

One man's trash...

Not everything carried out of the buildings is taken away in either of the two huge dumpsters parked out front. The copper pipes were removed by scavengers years ago, but right now there's still enough "good garbage" for the "junk guys" to make our work site one of their regular stops.

One of their recent prizes was a refrigerator from an apartment on one of the upper floors. There are other items–some large, some small–that will be considered "finds." Among them, a kitchen sink...
...and a commercial dryer, from the laundromat that once operated in the first floor of 2524.

More beams, more debris

In 2526, there was major progress installing the overhead beams and (on top of them) the plywood flooring that allows scaffolding to be erected so that work can progress on the upper floors. By week's end, new beams had been installed in the front section of the building from the first to the fourth floor, and plywood had been laid on the fifth floor.
The photo above shows preparations for beams to be installed on the second floor of 2526.

This week the last pile of debris was pushed down to the first floor of 2524 from the top floors of the building. Three workers carried this mess outside in one workday.
The sign on the rubbish heap asks "Where will you spend eternity?" It appeared with the debris that was swept down from above.
This was the way the area pictured above looked at the end of the work week.

With the debris removed...

Our former church building has been boarded up and filled with rubble for so many years that it can be both surprising and heartwarming to discover what is visible now that the debris is getting cleared out.

Below is the interior view of the the entrance into the church (from the street).


Directly inside the entrance is a gaping hole that spans approximately a third of the width of the building.

This is the view into the back (public) hallway. We used to go through here to reach our Sunday School/Head Start classroom. Do you remember the distinctive green paint on the door leading to the outside?

New beams!

Removal of debris continued during the third week of work. By Friday, July 18, two major milestones were reached: New beams had been installed in the front part of the first floor of 2526, and debris had been pushed down and removed from all four floors above the front part of 2524.

The steel beams—structurally sound components of the original sturdily-built building—were painted, and new beams were installed.

This photo was taken from the roof of our building at 2522 Adam Clayton Powell Jr Blvd (formerly Seventh Avenue), looking down into the work site at 2524. During this third week of the gut renovation phase, debris from the second floor/front was moved downstairs and carried out to the dumpsters; then debris from the third floor/front was moved downstairs and carried out to the dumpsters; then debris from the fourth floor/front was moved downstairs and carried out to the dumpsters; then debris from the fifth floor/front was moved downstairs and carried out to the dumpsters. By Friday afternoon, the structural "bones" of this area were finally visible.

Before renovation could begin...

This was what we encountered when the the buildings were opened in February of 2006 for the stabilization phase of work to begin.

At day's end, Friday, July 11

From the doorway at 2524, one of the commercial dryers from the former laundromat is visible among the remaining debris.

Next door, plywood now covers the gaping holes in the floor. This is the space that served as the original sanctuary of Seventh Avenue Mennonite Church and was the first classroom for our Head Start program.

Gut Renovation Begins!

On July 3rd, the contractors and the containers arrived outside our buildings to begin the "gut renovation" phase of the Joshua Plaza building project. News traveled quickly because we have been waiting, working and praying for this day for so long! (The fire that destroyed 2526 and 2524 Seventh Avenue took place in October 1974.)

The photo above was taken on the morning of July 10, when four workdays had already been completed.