Quote:
Originally Posted by Reecemartin
For someone with more engineering / building experience why does a new office tower like CIBC Square in Toronto have significant structural steel compared something like the office towers we are seeing here?
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...-_20190919.jpg
Is it purely a cost thing? I thought steel performed better seismically? With an article I recently read I'm wondering how many of these new builds will survive a big one. |
I'm not an engineer, but have always understood that structural steel in Vancouver is quite a bit more expensive than poured in place reinforced concrete. The aggregates to make concrete come from places like Sechelt, by barge to the batching plants (on the Fraser River, Granville Island or Burrard Inlet), and the cement is manufactured in the lower mainland as well. Only the reinforcing bars have to come a distance. Steel for buildings is more readily available in Toronto.
Structural steel generally costs more because it has to be transported (and of course recently also faced tariffs if it was imported from the US). There are very few local steel erection experts. The only steel highrise under construction currently is Westbank's W Georgia office tower, and the steel element of the contract is by a Quebec firm. (The structural steel on the rebuilt BC Place stadium were supplied by another Quebec company). There are many experienced concrete formwork companies.
While steel erection allows a few advantages - cantilevered overhangs like the Telus Garden office, or the current Deloitte Westbank office on W Georgia, concrete allows more sinuous designs, with changes in the floorplate on each floor, like the Bing Thom designed office currently being built on Burrard.
Both types of building are built to code that requires a high seismic performance. Older concrete buildings might have seismic issues - but so do older steel frame buildings as well. The proposed concrete highrise on W Hastings next to the 1930s steel framed Royal Bank is being designed to improve the seismic performance of the heritage building.
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