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City: Crane collapse building mistakenly allowed

By David Freedlander, amNewYork Staff Writer
More stories | dfreedlander@am-ny.com

April 18, 2008

The East Side building whose towering construction crane collapsed last month, killing seven people, should never have been built on the cramped Turtle Bay side street, the Department of Buildings' chairwoman said Thursday.

Zoning laws covering the site did not permit the construction of the 43-story tower on East 51st Street, an error that the chairwoman, Patricia Lancaster, described as an oversight during her testimony Thursday at a tense council hearing.

"That is beyond shocking," said Councilwoman Jessica Lappin (D-Manhattan), who represents the area where the accident occurred. "What does it take?"

Lappin directed withering question to the head of an agency that is widely viewed as being lax on oversight. Ten people have been killed in construction-related accidents in 2008 alone, including one earlier this week at another East Side building, this one on 67th Street.

Lappin said several people in the neighborhood had asked the buildings department how a 43-story tower could be built on a side street. She said the agency rebuffed their concerns.

"Why does it take a tragedy and a city council hearing to find out that this was an illegal building?" she said. "People in my district tell me they cross the street to avoid construction sites because they don't believe the buildings are safe."

Lappin added that it was likely the dangerous crane was necessary in order to maneuver in the kind of tight space that a tall building on a side street requires.

The Department of Buildings also announced yesterday that the agency had completed a citywide inspection of construction cranes and determined that eight of the 29 currently in use are not in compliance with safety regulations.

"The public can rest assured that the majority of the tower cranes did pass inspection, but our inspectors uncovered eight tower cranes with unacceptable violations," Lancaster said. "The Buildings Department shut down these cranes and required the individuals responsible to immediately address the violating conditions."

But many were left unsatisfied.

"Commission Lancaster has to step down," said Tony Avella (D-Bayside.) "How many more people have to die before something is done?"

(With AP)