Brycon In The News
Veteran’s Administration Hospital Stairwell Construction, Albuquerque
At first glance, adding stairs to the six-story Veteran’s Administration Hospital doesn’t sound like much of a project. But consider a few of the obstacles: the stairs need to be installed in the center of a busy, operating hospital; BRYCON’s team needed to cut out and remove six floors of concrete to make room for the stairs; and half of the stairs had to be lowered into place by a cable before being secured. “It’s pretty impressive,” said project manager Russ Snyder.
When the hospital was originally built, a centrally located stairwell was in the plans. But the stairs weren’t built for funding reasons, which eventually caused extreme stress on the hospital’s elevator system. Instead, the space for the stairwell was used as laundry rooms on each of the six floors. To retrofit the stairwell, BRYCON’s team removed 73 tons of concrete and rebar flooring and walls from the laundry rooms. Starting on the top story, shoring was installed two floors down. Then, the floor of each laundry room was cut out, carved into one-ton slabs and removed from the hospital using the public elevator. The shoring was then removed and leapfrogged down two floors. When the floors of all six stories were removed, BRYCON began installing the stairs. Because of limited access, the stairs are being installed in halves. The risers from the intermediate landing to the floor above are being installed from the ground floor up. However, the risers from the intermediate landing to the floor below are being hoisted from the basement and raised into place before being secured. The hoist operator must rely on radio communication with his team to position the stairs properly. When that floor of stairs is securerd, a hole is cut in the center to allow the next floor of stairs to be hoisted into place.
