TRENDS: CONSTRUCTION SITES
Say goodbye to your sneak peek
With windowless hoarding going up all over the city, Torontonians will be shut out of the building process
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/serv...TPStory/?query=Say+Goodbye+To+Your+Sneak+Peek
NADJA SAYEJ
Mary Gooderham
June 30, 2007
'Run, Billy, run!" construction workers at Yonge and Church yell to one of their colleagues as he makes a dash for the outhouse. He tries the door, but someone is already in there. As he waits, looking uncomfortable, his colleagues burst into laughter.
Typically, we might see this sort of scene play out through a construction-site-hoarding peephole. But site supervisors around Toronto are ditching the window cutout. For instance, The Fence People Ltd., a Brampton-based company that rents and sells hoardings, says there is no longer a demand for the peephole style. Rick D'Andrea, the company president, says he hasn't sold or rented one in almost five years. "They just don't use them any more," he says.
It's just one more step in the quirky march of progress.
Traditionally, Torontonians have been curious about new buildings going up in their neighbourhoods. Ron Duffy, a bookseller passing the Regent Park site on his bike ride home, elaborates: "Without them, it kind of messes with the logic of time; one day they're digging and, poof, there's a building," he says.
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But many developers now like to keep a building's progress a secret until it can stand on its own. Michael Patchul, for one, an operations manager at a Yonge and College site, says, "We don't use peepholes because we want a wow, a bang, a polished finished product."
Lisanne Lentinga, a student at the International Academy of Design and Technology, is annoyed by the new trend. "It's so Toronto," she says, passing by a site at Mutual and Carlton Streets on her way to class. "They don't want people stopping and looking - just keep the traffic moving along, you know?"
However, peepholes were never originally intended as an entertainment device for passersby. "First of all, peepholes are not for people," says foreman Scott Gregory at a site at Church and Gerrard. "They're for us. We use them for measurements."
Each construction-site peephole, about the size of a 30-by-30-centimetre window, is used for "gridlines," or aligning walls within a grid. To measure distances that stretch across a block, there literally have to be holes in walls. Construction workers look through the peepholes with a one-eyed measuring tool called a "transit," and mark a five-cm X on the sidewalk with a jackhammer (sometimes they're spray-painted orange) to show where a peephole once was.
"For safety reasons, we like to avoid peepholes," Mr. Gregory says, explaining that curious onlookers sometimes stick their heads in. "If we have enough room to do the gridlines within the site, we will."
If there is at least a one-metre "border" around a building, construction workers can do the gridline measurements within the site. And some sites build temporary sidewalks within a site, just for measurements and to avoid using peepholes.
The peepholes can be a nuisance in other ways. Paul Rizzuto, the super of a site at Yorkville Avenue and Bellair Street, says they attract litterbugs. "People get out of their cars and throw their fast-food trash in here like it's some kind of garbage dump." He tried to cover the peepholes with chicken wire, but says, "It's harder to see through with the transit instruments when chicken wire is in the way."
But pedestrians aren't the only ones who will miss the strange little windows into the world of rising steel girders. Sean Wright, a construction worker at Bay and College, says, "It's a safety issue for us who stick our heads out to the sidewalk when pretty girls walk by."
Caution, work overhead
The word "hoarding" - associated with a miser's treatment of gold - may seem out of place on a construction site, but not if you consider how contractors feel about their equipment.
Hoardings were first erected by builders in the 19th century to keep people from carrying off tools and materials. Protecting the public was not at that time an important consideration. But the public at least put the unsightly barrier to good use. The wall became a convenient place for posting notices and advertisements.
Over time, hoarding - often pluralized today - has been transformed from the ad-strewn fence guarding tools to an often sterile structure that protects the public from careless workers. Many cities, concerned for pedestrians' safety, set standards for hoarding design: Roofs, for instance, must be able to withstand falling hammers, bolts and chunks of concrete.
Nothing will protect passersby from hurtling concrete buckets, so traffic is stopped when heavy objects are hoisted above the street.
Say goodbye to your sneak peek
With windowless hoarding going up all over the city, Torontonians will be shut out of the building process
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/serv...TPStory/?query=Say+Goodbye+To+Your+Sneak+Peek
NADJA SAYEJ
Mary Gooderham
June 30, 2007
'Run, Billy, run!" construction workers at Yonge and Church yell to one of their colleagues as he makes a dash for the outhouse. He tries the door, but someone is already in there. As he waits, looking uncomfortable, his colleagues burst into laughter.
Typically, we might see this sort of scene play out through a construction-site-hoarding peephole. But site supervisors around Toronto are ditching the window cutout. For instance, The Fence People Ltd., a Brampton-based company that rents and sells hoardings, says there is no longer a demand for the peephole style. Rick D'Andrea, the company president, says he hasn't sold or rented one in almost five years. "They just don't use them any more," he says.
It's just one more step in the quirky march of progress.
Traditionally, Torontonians have been curious about new buildings going up in their neighbourhoods. Ron Duffy, a bookseller passing the Regent Park site on his bike ride home, elaborates: "Without them, it kind of messes with the logic of time; one day they're digging and, poof, there's a building," he says.
Print Edition - Section Front
Enlarge Image
But many developers now like to keep a building's progress a secret until it can stand on its own. Michael Patchul, for one, an operations manager at a Yonge and College site, says, "We don't use peepholes because we want a wow, a bang, a polished finished product."
Lisanne Lentinga, a student at the International Academy of Design and Technology, is annoyed by the new trend. "It's so Toronto," she says, passing by a site at Mutual and Carlton Streets on her way to class. "They don't want people stopping and looking - just keep the traffic moving along, you know?"
However, peepholes were never originally intended as an entertainment device for passersby. "First of all, peepholes are not for people," says foreman Scott Gregory at a site at Church and Gerrard. "They're for us. We use them for measurements."
Each construction-site peephole, about the size of a 30-by-30-centimetre window, is used for "gridlines," or aligning walls within a grid. To measure distances that stretch across a block, there literally have to be holes in walls. Construction workers look through the peepholes with a one-eyed measuring tool called a "transit," and mark a five-cm X on the sidewalk with a jackhammer (sometimes they're spray-painted orange) to show where a peephole once was.
"For safety reasons, we like to avoid peepholes," Mr. Gregory says, explaining that curious onlookers sometimes stick their heads in. "If we have enough room to do the gridlines within the site, we will."
If there is at least a one-metre "border" around a building, construction workers can do the gridline measurements within the site. And some sites build temporary sidewalks within a site, just for measurements and to avoid using peepholes.
The peepholes can be a nuisance in other ways. Paul Rizzuto, the super of a site at Yorkville Avenue and Bellair Street, says they attract litterbugs. "People get out of their cars and throw their fast-food trash in here like it's some kind of garbage dump." He tried to cover the peepholes with chicken wire, but says, "It's harder to see through with the transit instruments when chicken wire is in the way."
But pedestrians aren't the only ones who will miss the strange little windows into the world of rising steel girders. Sean Wright, a construction worker at Bay and College, says, "It's a safety issue for us who stick our heads out to the sidewalk when pretty girls walk by."
Caution, work overhead
The word "hoarding" - associated with a miser's treatment of gold - may seem out of place on a construction site, but not if you consider how contractors feel about their equipment.
Hoardings were first erected by builders in the 19th century to keep people from carrying off tools and materials. Protecting the public was not at that time an important consideration. But the public at least put the unsightly barrier to good use. The wall became a convenient place for posting notices and advertisements.
Over time, hoarding - often pluralized today - has been transformed from the ad-strewn fence guarding tools to an often sterile structure that protects the public from careless workers. Many cities, concerned for pedestrians' safety, set standards for hoarding design: Roofs, for instance, must be able to withstand falling hammers, bolts and chunks of concrete.
Nothing will protect passersby from hurtling concrete buckets, so traffic is stopped when heavy objects are hoisted above the street.