The client decided to lease an open space in an existing outdoor mall. It was March and the store was to open for Christmas season, which begins October 1.
In addition to the normal build out and a fire sprinkler and HVAC upgrade, the client wanted to add the roof tower with the Geoffrey the Giraffe logo typical to Toys R Us. This necessitated strengthening the roof to handle the additional loads. The roof was constructed with steel joists, a very economical proprietary manufactured product common throughout the country.
The client contacted the architect who contacted the structural engineer for the original project. The engineer didn’t want to work on proprietary manufactured products, so they contacted the manufacturer. Manufacturers are typically not set up to reengineer their products outside of their original production design. So the manufacturer told then they needed to get an engineer to do it. The first engineer consulted another engineer who helped him to develop the new loading conditions but who also didn’t know how to work on the proprietary manufactured trusses. After 6 weeks, with time ticking away towards the grand Christmas rush opening, they were referred to EFS.
EFS received the call on a Friday, set up a conference call with the client and all of the design professionals on Monday, sent a proposal to the client on Tuesday, was under contract on Thursday, completed first phase engineering over the weekend sufficient to get field crews working Monday, completed all engineering the next Friday and completely finished all of the roof structure strengthening the following Friday, 15 days from contract to completion as promised.
The project was back on track.
