‘We’re stuck here:’ Seniors ask for quieter construction at downtown building | CBC News

Residents at a downtown Windsor seniors’ complex say noisy construction made life in the building practically unlivable this year, but the building’s owner says the retrofits are “a little bit of pain for a better gain.”

The residents are asking that the schedule and means of construction be more amenable for the seniors living in the building next year. 

“It just reverberates so loud,” resident Wayne Craig said. 

“That’s the sound and it goes on and on and on and on, all day every day for the last four or five months.”

The 20-storey, 300-unit Raymond Desmarais Manor is located at 255 Riverside Drive. It provides subsidized and rent-to-income geared apartments for seniors. 

The building was built nearly 50 years ago has been undergoing a retrofit over the past few years to modernize it and make it more energy efficient.

Jeff Belanger, the chief housing infrastructure officer for Windsor Essex Community Housing Corporation (CHC), said it would have cost $45 million to build a new building, but the retrofit cost is predicted to be about one third of that.

Work to install new windows, new elevators and a new mechanical system have already been done. The focus of the work is now on the exterior retrofit — it’s the largest component of the project and is adding insulation and protective cladding to outside of the building while refurbishing the balconies.

“This preserves the building for another 50 years, so we’re looking at it as a long-term solution,” Belanger said.

“There’s a certain amount of understanding that you have to have that noise, you can’t finish the job without that.”

But several residents of the building told CBC News that the constant work on the building has not been conducive to senior living as noisy drilling, they said, took place nearly every day through the summer and fall months including on holidays like Remembrance Day and Thanksgiving.

Craig said the noise would often drown out his television set and he would often have to take to the streets on some of the hottest days of the summer to escape the constant droning of drills, he said.

“Where are you going to go during the day,” he said. 

“This is a building of seniors. This is people that are not working through the day who can leave. We’re stuck here and then, this is what we have to put up with.”

Barry Whelan, another resident, said that the noise would ricochet and echo throughout each of the apartments on his floor and that residents were left to their own devices when it came to dealing with it.

“I go to the local library. I actually go to the casino and I’ll spend time there, people watching and I’ll go down to the river and I have friends too close by too,” he said.

Whelan said he has a heart condition, which makes getting proper rest extremely important.

“You have a constant pressure on you of how to deal with it best,” he said. 

Whelan said that the extent of the noisiness of the work was not communicated to them at the outset of the project and the way they have gone about the construction has been very disrespectful.

“Social housing, it’s a class that we’ve earned that we don’t have the rights that regular tenants would have just simply because we are vulnerable,” he said. 

Loud process

Belanger said that balcony construction, in general, is a very loud process but there is a liaison manager which was hired specifically to be a go-between with the tenants, contractor and staff as well as social workers who will help tenants if there are accommodations needed.  

“If you want to go to a different unit, we made that available for people and if there’s special needs someone has we work together with the social workers to see if there’s anything we can do, ” Belanger said. 

“Whenever you come into a building which has had no construction for years, it’s a big change for people to accept.”

Belanger said that work happens, for the most part, between the hours of 8 a.m. and 5 p.m. and permission is needed to work beyond those hours or on weekends.

Otherwise, he said, they work within what is allowed by city bylaws which states there should be no construction before 6 a.m. and after 8 p.m. 

“There might be occasional work that has to happen seven days a week but we have to get permission from the contractor,” he said.

“If contractors are available and we have to get caught up on a schedule, we may have to work that overtime to keep that schedule.” 

Belanger could not say exactly how much work was done in exceptional hours this year but a spokesperson said the agency would follow up and provide those numbers to the CBC. 

Work resumes in spring

According to an email provided by a tenant, work was scheduled to end on Friday, Dec. 15 but plans to resume are set for next spring on the south facing side of the building. Craig is asking for a schedule more conducive to senior living when it starts back up.

“We need five days and then on the weekend, we can recover,” Craig said.

Belanger said that the heavy drilling has been completed on both sides of the building but there could be some noise due to the work to install and trowel insulation.

“In any of our buildings where we do improvements, we do acknowledge that there’s going to be a little bit of pain for a better gain,” he said.