City received no warning about potential collapse of Hintonburg building

Photo: Wayne Cuddington / Postmedia

Wednesday, July 25, 2018

OTTAWA CITIZEN, By Jon Willing and Joanne Laucius

The historic stone building that crumbled in Hintonburg this week was one of 23 properties on a heritage watch list for deterioration, but the city says there was no warning sign pointing to an imminent collapse.

The west-facing wall of the heritage building at 1119 Wellington St. W. cascaded like a chunky, dangerous waterfall Tuesday evening. No one was reported injured.

Architect Ovidio Sbrissa has owned the building for 17 years. He has lived on the top two floors and used the ground floor for an office. When he bought it, the ground floor was a furniture store called Anything Goes, Sbrissa said.

He left the building shortly after 5 p.m. Tuesday after a neighbour invited him to get a pizza on Preston Street.

Shortly later, he received the shocking news.

“We got a call from a neighbour saying the wall fell,” Sbrissa said Wednesday.

“Even my structural engineer was in awe that it happened. Those kinds of walls just don’t collapse that way,” he said. “I never saw any problems or cracks.”

The building’s stone walls were all recently repointed, which means to fill in or repair the brickwork joints, he said.

Sbrissa said he had proposed building apartments around the historical property and was looking for pre-construction financing.

The Magee House, which dates back to 1874 and is named after a family that lived there, received a heritage designation from the former city of Ottawa in 1996.

Frank Bidin, the city’s chief building official, said the city asked experts at engineering and consulting firm Stantec for a visual inspection Tuesday night to assess the status of the building, which was at risk of further collapse.

On Wednesday morning, the city hired John G. Cooke and Associates, a firm with experience in structural engineering and heritage conservation, for a more comprehensive investigation. There is no timeline on the Cooke report.

Bidin said the city doesn’t know what caused the wall to collapse.

“The report should be able to provide us with a greater determination of the building itself and probably provide us with more information in terms of next steps. Obviously public safety is our first priority,” Bidin said.

Six adults were displaced from an adjacent building and helped by the Red Cross and Salvation Army, Bidin said.

Court Curry, the manager who oversees the city’s heritage program, said the building is on an inventory list of vacant heritage-protected buildings and city officials were surprised to learn Tuesday night that someone was living in it.

The city has done visual inspections of the building every two months for the past two years, with the most recent inspection happening last month, Curry said.

There were property standard orders issued in June 2017, but only on heritage elements — architecturally unique features such as detailing and windows — not the structure. The bylaw orders were partially complied with, Curry said, but he didn’t have the details.

Staff plan to provide the built-heritage subcommittee with another update during a meeting on Aug. 2.

The city launched a “heritage matters” task force in 2016 to protect historic properties. The mayor-led task force was partly in response to the ongoing saga at the decrepit Somerset House at Somerset and Bank streets, but its work has covered the city, cracking down on cases of demolition by neglect.

David Flemming is a past president of Heritage Ottawa and a member of the task force.

The Magee House has been on the task force’s radar for two years, Flemming said, and many heritage buffs had reported that there was a bulge in the west wall of the building and a metal plate had been installed.

“At our meeting in January, city staff reported that there were work orders on the building in 2017. We heard that the city was taking the owner to court. Our next meeting, in April, was cancelled,” Flemming said.

Bidin said his department received no information in the days preceding the collapse to suggest there was danger.

Some residents passing by Magee House on Wednesday evening called it the quintessential “old” house on the street, while others, staring into the gaping hole on the side of the building, simply called it a “sad day.”

— With files from Kieran Delamont

 

Magee House is one of 23 buildings on the heritage watch list.

Properties on the city’s task force watch list:

330 Gilmour St. (former board of education building)
590 Hazeldean Rd. (Craig Barn and Farmhouse)
173 Huntmar Dr. (Boyd Farm)
1119 Wellington St. W. (Magee House)
590 Broadview Ave. (old Broadview school)
2720 Richmond Rd. (Grant school)
70 Nicholas St. (old registry office)
46 Cartier St. (abandoned Syrian embassy)
21 Withrow Ave. (old house on “Kilmorie” property)
488 Bank St. (mixed-use building)
287 Cumberland St. (old St. Brigid’s school)
58 Florence St. (house)
179 Guigues Ave. (house)
79 Guigues Ave. (house)
1 Maple Lane/112 Lisgar Rd. (house)
143 Murray St. (house)
352 Somerset St. (Somerset House, former Duke of Somerset)
197 Wilbrod St. (house)
201 Wilbrod St. (house)
514 Manor Ave. (house)
231 Cobourg St. (former house/office)
187 Lansdowne Rd. (house)
5897 Fernbank Rd. (Flewellyn/Jones House)