Disaster Response United States Project #12137

Hurricane Sandy Reconstruction

by Architecture for Humanity

Project Report | Oct 31, 2014
What's Ahead: Hurricane Sandy Reconstruction

By Brian Baer | Regional Program Manager

Reflecting on 2 years since Hurricane Sandy

Since we started our first year of aid in the Tri-State area, we discovered that as a region, the devastation left by the storm exposed the fragility of our built environment – how prepared or unprepared we were in our properties, our neighborhoods, and our selves. We have seen the large-scale destruction of homes, businesses, streets, and communities.

More importantly though as we remember today, is that we have moved from recovery to reconstruction. No longer are we “victims” of Sandy’s wrath. We continue to actively seek opportunities to guide and create a better built environment for those that call this region home.

In the coming months, the Hurricane Sandy Reconstruction program will continue to support and provide resources within our abilities to more property owners, organizations, and municipalities to create sustainable, mitigated, adapted, resilient, and timeless homes, businesses, and communities. We will continue to explore new and enhance current relationships with like-minded partners to truly make this a place to call home.

As we look ahead, we also want to celebrate a year of reflection, learning, and progress. We set out to focus on the vulnerable communities and demographics with the greatest need for design and construction services. Using the power of design to rebuild sustainably and more resiliently, we completed several components of our initial goals:

Early in 2014, we completed our pilot program of the Sandy Design Help Desk. Starting in Far Rockaway, Queens, and ending in Red Hook, Brooklyn, we offered free design consultations to a wide variety of property owners. The consultations offered owners the opportunity to meet with the design professionals that we trained in resilient, sustainable design methodology to provide opportunities to reconstruct their homes and businesses in a responsible manner.
In late May and early June, our design and construction teams broke ground at Toms River High School North (Toms River, New Jersey) and Washington School (Little Ferry, New Jersey), respectively. The construction teams progressed through the summer months and, in early September, completed the reconstruction work on time and on budget.
After this summer’s tourist season ended, we started construction on the sunshade structures on Seaside Heights’ historic boardwalk. These structures were designed with resilience and timeless thought and are now complete.
In the spring of this year, we authored and launched our Resilience through Education and Design Centers. Focusing on assisting small property owners still recovering from the effects of Sandy, the program offers free design consultations through a design clinic where responsible, resilient, and sustainable solutions are offered. The second phase of the program affords a client to receive pro bono design and construction services in reconstructing their property.
We have made great strides in identifying and collaborating with new partner organizations, as well as enhancing our existing relationships toward a common goal: to assist the people who live and work around New York City and the Tri-State region to create a more resilient network of communities for generations to come.
We have identified that there remains a significant need in the region for our services. Too many people still have difficulty asking the question, “How do I begin to think about rebuilding, let alone do it, and protect my home and family from future storms?” There are thousands of property owners who still need that question answered. We continue to receive compelling stories from individual property owners seeking sources to reconstruct their homes and businesses.

We have learned much about what we can do and, equally important, what we should not do in the future. We have seen design competitions present hundreds of incredible ideas that attempt to solve reconstruction challenges in our area in an innovative, resilient, and sustainable manner. We have learned how to help ourselves, how to help our neighbors, communities, and the region.

ReNew Schools: Washington School, Little Ferry NJ

ReNew Schools: Toms River High School North, NJ

Restore the Shore, Seaside Heights, NJ

Sandy Design Help Desk

REDC

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Architecture for Humanity

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Aug 6, 2014
Sandy Digest: July 2014

By Brian Baer | Regional Program Coordinator

REDC Seaside Heights

Some outstanding activity was seen in the Sandy program last month. The ReNew Schools program commenced construction at two of the schools; while our Restore the Shore program went out to bid and launched a new initiative.

The new program element is entitled: the Resilience through Education and Design Center (REDC). Partnering with disaster case management organizations local to each community, the intent of this program is to provide property owners an opportunity to receive free design consultations from trained architects and engineers in the latest resilience and sustainable design/building methodology. Once a client receives their consultation, they are eligible to receive further design and construction assistance within the program. The consultations were held on the weekend of July 19th with a great success to which 15 clients attended.

In July, we also doubled our staff by welcoming two outstanding individuals. Lila Tedesco and Mika Flomin joined our team as volunteers. Each bring their passion to help rebuild and guide the metropolitan New York region into greater resilience. Both assisted our team during the Sandy Design Help Desk held last and earlier this year, caught the bug, and now are welcome additions to our team.

PROJECT UPDATES

ReNew Schools: Washington School

With the school year ending much later than usual (due to an inordinate amount of snow days), the painters have finally been able to roll into the gymnasium and paint the walls...complete with bouncing ball graphics! Installation of the new rubberized surface is next, allowing the community access to the space after a two-year closure.

ReNew Schools: Toms River High School North

Construction is moving forward. The ticket booth has been framed out, and the press box is following close behind.

ReNew Schools: Memorial School

The design team at Pennoni has been plugging away at design documentation for the field reconstruction, and the design of the dugouts at the softball and baseball diamonds. We're on track to have the work completed so we can start and ultimately finish the construction before the start of soccer season in September.

Restore the Shore

Trinity Construction, selected to build the sunshade structures, met with the Team to walk through the proposed locations along the boardwalk. The team investigated the boardwalk's pile foundations to understand how they will begin tying in the sunshade's cantilevered construction.

EVENTS

FEMA Region 2 ICP Workshops - August 12 and 13:
The 2nd Annual Individual and Community Preparedness Workshop; Enhancing Community Preparedness through Collaboration

PROJECT TRACKING

Project Name | Project Stage | % Stage Complete

Restore the Shore CA 5%

ReNew Schools: Washington School, Little Ferry CA 15%

ReNew Schools: Toms River High School North, Toms River CA 25%

ReNew Schools: Memorial School, Union Beach CD 95%

CA Construction Administration; CD Construction Document; DD Design Development; SD Schematic Design; PD Pre-Design- About the Phases

Washington School Elementary gymnasium

Toms River High School North

Restore the Shore - sunshades for boardwalk

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Architecture for Humanity

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May 5, 2014
Students Capture Toms River Recovery

By Yuko Okamura | Communications Associate

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