Posts tagged Fire
-
How single-stair apartments can improve fire safety
A common objection to requiring only one staircase in new residential buildings is that it would roll back safety regulations to cut costs. But in fact, single-stair reforms have the potential to get more people into safer buildings. Keep reading…
-
Adding sprinklers to older buildings is expensive, but it’s worth it
Needless to say, a fire is not when you want to find out you are missing a lifesaving tool. And honestly, when’s the last time you looked at your fire safety plan where you live, if you even have one? This is exactly the kind of thing the government is here to regulate. Keep reading…
-
Metro Reasons: Metro removes some fire extinguishers to fight vandalism
Fire extinguishers will soon no longer be available for riders to use on Metro's fleet of rail cars. Some riders keep spraying them in the cars, so the agency says they’re being removed in order to reduce abuse. Keep reading…
-
National links: Self-driving trucks, not cars, are in our near future
Our self-driving future may not be quite as imminent as you think. Millennials would like to kill cars, but most don't have good alternatives for getting around. Boomers aren't moving into senior housing as quickly as previous generations. Keep reading…
-
Metro Reasons: An unreported fire closed a station a year before a 2016 explosion. What did WMATA know about the risk?
An insulator caught fire and filled the Benning Road Metro station with heavy, thick smoke in a previously-unreported incident from August 2015. This came nine months prior to the insulator explosion in the Federal Center Southwest station in 2016, and raises new questions about what WMATA knew of the risks from its power system. Keep reading…
-
Metro’s Fire Marshal office is understaffed and overworked
On top of not performing all its assigned responsibilities, a report says the Fire Marshal's “mission statement, goals, responsibilities, procedures, schedules, standards of inspection, etc. have not yet been developed and there is no time table to develop them.” Keep reading…
-
This exhibit shows how you can build a high-rise out of…wood?
“Timber City,” an exhibit on the second floor of the National Building Museum, lets visitors go hands-on with the new “mass timber” technologies that have made wood construction trendy again. The exhibit closes next week, on September 10. Keep reading…
-
Metro put up big red boxes to stop people bypassing the fare gates
If you ride Metro with any regularity, I'm sure you've seen a person or two walk straight through the swinging metal gates next to the gates where you swipe your SmarTrip card. At Gallery Place and Fort Totten, there are now signs, cardboard barriers, and alarms in place to make people think twice before they do that. Keep reading…
-
Breakfast links: Nothing new in Alexandria
No new single-family detached homes; MoCo needs lots more rentals; Bowser meeting with Trump today; Can you hear me (in Metro) now?; Questionable bike ticketing; Arlington will likely make car2go official; Facebook giveth; Is safe, affordable housing for artists possible?. Keep reading…
-
Breakfast links: A scary ride?
Seeing red on the Red Line; How to be a bus rider; Union opts for re-training; Mixed-use outcry madness; MoCo’s land swap; Dog park drama; Gentrification of the sausage. Keep reading…