Summer 2003 ILSR conducted a Phase One deconstruction pilot project in cooperation with the City of Philadelphia Neighborhood Transformation Initiative (NTI) during the summer 2003. NTI is a multi-year strategy for eliminating blight ad revitalizing communities in Philadelphia. ILSR’s Jim Primdahl supervised the two City-chosen demolition contractors in the pilot project that resulted in the deconstruction … Read More
2002 ILSR helped the Umpqua County Community Development Corporation (UCCDC) prepare a successful application to HHS, providing funds to create 13 new jobs in deconstruction over three years. (Six low-income workers already have been trained and employed at this writing.) Once funds were awarded, we helped train UCCDC staff, primarily in business management and development to … Read More
Sept/Oct, 2002 Waste Stream: The Deconstructionists In a Portland, Oregon, suburb, the six-man crew of DeConstruction, Inc., enters a three-bedroom house and, with hammers and crowbars, starts tearing the place apart. The cabinets and carpet are first to go. Then the doors are unhinged and the hardwood floors pulled up. Over the next week, the whole … Read More
ILSR’s 20-page booklet, Innovation, Leadership, Stewardship, features Alameda County’s (California) record-setting recycling programs. The county diverts almost 60% of its municipal solid waste. The Alameda County Waste Management Authority and the Alameda County Source Reduction and Recycling Board deserve much credit. This glossy booklet — chock full of case studies and photographs — features the Board’s source … Read More
August 2002 Hello Dwell, I enjoyed the renovations I have read about in your magazine. I wonder, though, if I want to renovate, say, my kitchen, what can I do with the cabinets and other furnishings so they don’t just end up in the landfill?–James Welker Dear James, There’s always a hard way to do things. … Read More
2000-2001 In 1998, ILSR met with the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) to explain how programs like HUD’s Hope VI (which provides hundreds of millions of dollars annually to demolish buildings) could use deconstruction to renovate public housing in an environmentally-sound manner, while helping HUD meet its Section 3 (community investment) obligations. At HUD … Read More
BioCycle; Emmaus May 2001 Dave Block THE REBUILDING Center in Portland, Oregon was founded in 1998 through a grant that covered a forklift and a 20-foot flatbed truck. Located 15 minutes from the metro transfer station, the 70,000square-foot facility sells used building materials, which initially were all donated by the general public and other contractors. It … Read More
Deconstruction is the careful disassembly of buildings to recover valuable materials – is at the “take-off” stage of development. For our staff at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance and many others, the definition of deconstruction also includes job creation in low income neighborhoods. Start-up companies and demonstration projects that involve traditional demolition companies in joint venture contracts are proving the viability of deconstruction.… Read More
The construction and demolition (C&D) industry generates and disposes almost 65 million tons of waste annually, much of which is reusable or recyclable. Our projects have shown deconstruction can recover up to 24 million tons of C&D waste each year for reuse, and another 6 million tons for recycling. By reducing waste generation, deconstruction also reduces … Read More
