AMCBO News Release   

 

MAJOR CITY & COUNTY BUILDING OFFICIALS COMMENT ON WORLD TRADE CENTER REPORT – URGES THAT CITY HIGH RISES REMAIN VIABLE

August 4, 2005, Herndon, VA. Noting that "high-rise buildings help make our nation’s major urban population centers economically and culturally viable," the Association of Major City & County Building Officials (AMCBO) offered cautious endorsement of the recommended improvements in the nation’s construction and building operations for high-rise structures contained in the June 23, 2005, draft final report of the National Construction Safety Team on the World Trade Center Collapse.

Issued by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) following three years of research into the causes of the collapse of the World Trade Center twin towers, the June WTC report contained 30 recommendations that were broken out into eight topic areas. Those eight areas are:

Founded in 1972 to represent the building commissioners of the nation’s largest cities, AMCBO urged that further technical research be done into the applicability of a number of the NIST recommendations to assure that practical and cost effective approaches be found towards applying some of those recommendations to the country’s existing high-rise building stock. AMCBO Chairman and Richmond Building Commissioner, Claude Cooper, noted that "cities have to have high-rise buildings for commercial, residential and cultural purposes. Cities will suffer if they lose the prospect of high-rise buildings because either they become too expensive to construct or rehabilitate or the public fears for their safety in such structures." The AMCBO response noted that "high-rise buildings in this nation have an enviable safety record."

Among specific technical comments in the AMCBO response was a suggestion that NIST work with the construction industry to find funding to conduct further needed research on enhanced fire resistance of structures and on the underlying assumptions of building design for life safety.

"While the WTC report and our response may appear to the lay person as being very technical in nature, the adoption and application of these recommendations by our nation’s codes and standards, construction and building management communities will have a major impact either to the benefit or to the detriment of our cities and their citizens. AMCBO urges elected officials in major cities and counties to pay attention to this report and its implementation."

The AMCBO submission has been forwarded to the U. S. Conference of Mayors and the National Association of Counties for distribution to their members.

AMCBO closed its submission by offering to assist NIST in its efforts to develop national support for the funding and implementation of the National Construction Safety Team’s recommendations. AMCBO plans to participate in the upcoming follow-up NIST World Trade Center Report Workshop being held in Gaithersburg, Maryland, on September 13-15, 2005.

For more information on AMCBO and a copy of the association’s submission to NIST, click on the AMCBO tab at the top of the homepage of www.ncsbcs.org. The NIST WTC report can be found at wtc.nist.gov.

 

AMCBO was founded in 1972 to provide major city and county building officials with a venue through which they can coordinate comments on code changes, respond to proposed federal legislation and regulations, and provide assistance to cities on codes administration and enforcement issues. AMCBO secretariat services are provided by the National Conference of States on Building Codes and Standards (NCSBCS). Information on AMCBO may be found on the NCSBCS website at www.ncsbcs.org.