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Post-Champlain Towers South tragedy condo building crackdowns are coming and now Florida could be facing its biggest real estate “crisis” in decades, NBC reports. Prices have dipped nearly 40% in some areas after a rash of new laws offloaded proactive maintenance costs onto the HOAs... View full entry
Regulations passed in Florida after the 2021 collapse of the Champlain Towers condominium have helped fuel the drive by developers to buy out and replace older residential buildings. The new rules have increased costs for residents in many older buildings, sometimes requiring sizeable special assessments that may be unaffordable. — NPR
The rush to improve building safety in the wake of the 2021 Surfside condo collapse has since produced some unintended and expensive consequences for residents of Florida condominiums, three-quarters of whom live in structures that are now more than 30 years old. While the laws’ intent is... View full entry
Preliminary details from the ongoing National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) investigation into the deadly 2021 collapse of the Champlain Towers South condominium building in Florida were shared recently, revealing evidence that supports theories about the precise source of its... View full entry
Zaha Hadid Architects has been revealed to lead the design of a new condominium project proposal at a site once occupied by the collapsed Champlain Towers South building in Surfside, Florida. The project is being commissioned by DAMAC International, which purchased the lot for $120 million in July... View full entry
Federal investigators have released their preliminary findings into the collapse of the Champlain Towers South condo building in Surfside, Florida. As reported by The New York Times, the building’s pool deck contained a “severe structural deficiency,” with construction in some areas failing... View full entry
The Miami Herald is partnering with 101 Studios and Grain Media on a documentary that will investigate the deadly 2021 collapse of Champlain Towers South in Surfside, Florida.
Surviving Surfside will interrogate the failure of the 12-story building in the early morning of June 24, 2021 that left 98 people dead and is still under official investigation, the companies announced on Tuesday.
— The Hollywood Reporter
The Herald's in-depth breaking news coverage of the disastrous Champlain Towers South collapse one year ago recently won the paper a Pulitzer Prize and will be a primary source of information for the upcoming Surviving Surfside documentary. Related feature article on Archinect: A House of Cards... View full entry
DAMAC Properties, a Dubai-based luxury real estate developer, has agreed to pay $120 million for the site where 98 people died in June when the Champlain Towers South residential tower collapsed in Surfside, Florida. — Construction Dive
DAMAC, owned by Emirati billionaire Hussain Sajwani, reportedly known as the “Donald Trump of Dubai,” set the minimum price of $120 million for the 2-acre property in 2021. No competing bids were submitted by last Friday’s deadline, resulting in the cancelation of an auction scheduled for... View full entry
Florida’s state legislature has failed to pass a bill which would have strengthened requirements to inspect and repair the state’s aging condo stock. The new legislation was drafted in response to the collapse of the Champlain Towers South condo building in June 2021, which killed 98 people... View full entry
Miami is now number one on a list of the most expensive areas to own a home in the United States according to statistics published in the industry blog The Real Deal. The city surpassed New York and Los Angeles in the February edition of RealtyHop’s Housing Affordability Index on the wings of a... View full entry
A new lawsuit filed on behalf of victims and family members of the Champlain Towers South collapse alleges that the incident was caused by construction work on an adjacent property. 98 people were killed when the condominium tower in Surfside, Florida collapsed suddenly in the early morning of... View full entry
In the wake of the deadly Champlain Towers collapse in Surfside, Florida in June, several groups are calling for improvements to building safety standards. The groups include a statewide association of contractors calling for steps to improve building structural safety, and a task force from... View full entry
But, it was a challenge, Ms. Singhvi said, to understand the architectural drawings without interviewing the original designers. So she and Mr. Baker spoke with experts including structural engineers, architects, geotechnical specialists, professors, lawyers and contractors, who answered questions about what the journalists were discovering and helped confirm they were reading the plans accurately. — The New York Times
The Times' 3D reconstruction of the collapse was very popular online as journalists and investigators dig over records of the original 1981 building by the now infamous William Friedman, who died in 2018. "Being able to read the design drawings helps enormously,” graphics editor Mika... View full entry
The Champlain Towers South design violated building codes at the time of original construction. On the northern side, under the portion of the tower that collapsed, the columns were too narrow to accommodate all of the vertical and horizontal rebar called for in the plans while maintaining clearance required by the code. The pool deck had narrow columns and inadequate load bearing capacity, engineers consulted by the Herald found. Only columns beneath the surviving structure were fully compliant — Miami Herald
A team consisting of Sarah Blaskey, Aaron Leibowitz and Ben Conarck worked with four engineers and a general contractor to analyze the "Anatomy of Collapse" and explain the failure of the Champlain Towers South in Surfside, FL. One key factor in the collapse appears to have been "punching shear"... View full entry
More than a decade before William Friedman designed the collapsed Surfside condominium, Florida’s board of architecture suspended him for six months for designing structures that toppled during Hurricane Betsy. Sign pylons that were “an integral part of the structure” of a Miami commercial building failed during the 1965 storm, according to documents from the Florida State Board of Architecture, obtained by The Real Deal. — The Real Deal
In its order suspending Friedman, the Florida Board of Architecture wrote that the pylons were “insufficient and grossly inadequate” and were not in accordance “to accepted standards of architectural practice.” In 1966, the board found Friedman guilty of “gross incompetency, in that he... View full entry
Almost one week after a Miami apartment complex partially collapsed, a 2018 report has resurfaced which warned of “major structural damage” to the base of the building. As reported by The Guardian and The New York Times, the 2018 survey identified a failing concrete slab on the pool deck and... View full entry
