TORONTO – Police have reopened University Avenue between Richmond and Adelaide after glass fell from the Shangri-La hotel Thursday morning.
Citing safety concerns, the road was closed as the glass was cleared.
The Shangri-La hotel is no stranger to falling glass as there were three similar reported incidents last year.
This prompted Toronto’s public works and infrastructure committee chair Denzil Minnan-Wong to call for more efforts to protect citizens from these occurrences.
Ontario’s building code was amended in July 1, 2012 to include new glass installation guidelines for builders following numerous incidents of falling glass reported a year prior.
But, the amendment doesn’t impact buildings already under construction and only applies to new builds after 2012.
The city’s role, according to chief building official Ann Borooah, is to verify all construction in the city complies with the Ontario Building Code.
The province says existing buildings are also not required to be retrofitted to the new requirements.
While it’s not known exactly what caused the piece of glass to become dislodged, Jeff Archbold, a professional engineer working in forensic engineering, said extreme fluctuations in weather can cause glass to loosen.
“Toronto will have more instances like this because again, we’ve got these extreme changes in temperatures,” he said. “You’re going to have more moderate temperatures in Vancouver or in Europe or in the southern states.”
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