Kingston City Hall is getting ready for some overdue fire and safety maintenance, but its status as a national historic site means workers on the Ontario Street landmark will have to be careful.
Greg Newman is the city’s policy planning manager. He says installation of new fire alarms and sprinklers throughout the 1840s heritage building, including Memorial Hall, is a daunting task.
“Fortunately, in Memorial Hall we have a drop ceiling that allows us to install most infrastructure in behind the ceiling itself so we will have very discreet openings to allow sprinkler heads to come through,” Newman said.
The maintenance work needs to be done in order to meet current Ontario building code and fire code requirements. Outside fixes are also on the agenda. Newman says stairs used for fire exits on the building’s north and south wings are in bad shape and need to be repaired.
“It’s evident that the stairway is experiencing some deterioration of the stone itself, and it’s important that we address the stone because with every heavy rainfall, we’re experiencing … water into the basement of city hall.”
For the aging building, that’s not a good thing. Recent rainfall leaking through the limestone steps has affected stone arches under both stairways. Newman says the ultimate goal is to hide the infrastructure as much as possible while conserving the heritage attributes of the exceptional building.