Results tagged “metal”

The city building code requires that wires pass through a fireproof conduit made of metal collars between floors, but a licensed master electrician with contracts at four Midtown hotels was caught using wood instead. Each metal collar costs $350, so it's likely that electrician Robert Spallino was able to cut costs by using wooden versions. It's also likely that the collars were flammable, being made of wood and all. A DOB source tells the Post that Spallino even painted the collars "a dark color in the hopes that they would go undetected." Buildings Commissioner Robert LiMandri says, "This contractor was willing to put people's lives in danger in order to save a few dollars, and his actions must not go unpunished." You might think the punishment would end Spallino's career, but he's just been suspended for a year. And the suspension won't begin for another eight months so he can close out existing contracts. Way to send a message, DOB! The wooden fakes have all been replaced with metal collars; they were found at the Garden Chelsea Hotel, the Holiday Inn on West 26th Street, the Sheraton Midtown Hotel on West 40th Street, and the Fairfield Inn on West 40th Street.

The unstoppable Peter Vallone, Jr. is at it again, fighting for a squeaky clean city that's free from both stuntmen and spray paint! With Jeb Corliss safely tucked away in California, his latest target is "unsightly metal shudders," according to NY1. Sure those security gates may protect stores from vandals and thieves, but Vallone contends they also encourage graffiti (which is on the rise in the city). As a solution "he wants to require all new gates sold and installed in the city to be at least 70 percent see through," something he believes would bring graffiti down 80 percent, even though glass is easily marked (though in all likelihood the graffiti writers will just spread the love elsewhere).

Forget about street furniture -- as far as sidewalk finds go, finding a metal wheel is the new finding a mid-century armchair! Restless spotted this gem in Greenpoint and reports that it's gone unclaimed for months. It's likely too heavy to throw over ones shoulder, but apparently metal is the hot commodity of sidewalk scavenging these days (he reports that people are often seen "walking from Long Island City across the Pulaski Bridge early in the morning with strange metal articles").