West Branch Engineering & Consulting PLLC

We are honored to receive a 2020 Excellence In Preservation Award from the Preservation League of NYS. We are in good company. Below is the list of awardees from across the State: River House Project | Hudson, Columbia County Fire Watchtower at Marcus Garvey Park | Manhattan, New York County Henry Street Settlement Dale Jones Burch Neighborhood Center | Manhattan, New York County... Ethel T. Chamberlain House | Syracuse, Onondaga County The Restoration & Adaptive Reuse of Building 207 | Fort Totten, Queens County The Architecture of Downtown Troy: An Illustrated History by Diana S. Waite | Troy Rensselaer County Cropsey Farm Barn Restoration & Rehabilitation | New City, Rockland County Restoration of the Yaddo Mansion | Saratoga Springs, Saratoga County Rehabilitation of Dr. Ferguson’s Office | Glens Falls, Warren County See more

Tip of the month. If it’s time to reshingle your home, have a talk with your contractor about proper nailing of the shingles. It is important to INCLUDE the crew, for they are the ones actually doing the work. Make sure they READ the mfg’s nailing instructions. They vary between mfg’s and they also vary BASED ON THE ROOF PITCH. Make sure they NAIL ON THE LINE provided by the manufacturer. Most shingles installed today are Architectural style, which have an additional lam...inate placed on top of the base shingle to create the texture. If you don’t nail on the line, you miss the laminate and it can slide off your roof over time, particularly on steeper pitches. The shingles can also tear away from the nail if not nailed on the line. The additional laminate acts like a washer, spreading the load. That is what happened to our shingles. Note in the photos, the nail holes are ABOVE the nailing line, missing the lower laminate. There was plenty of life left in the shingle itself, but I had to replace them because there were too many sliding off. This mistake happens more often than you think and is very unfortunate after dropping a ton to have your roof reshingled.

Below is a typical detail of a code compliant deck handrail.

Tune in tomorrow (Wednesday) at 2:00 PM to WAMC's call-in talk radio program where I will be fielding home improvement questions. I will be focusing on decks and patios since they may receive more use than usual this year. Call in (800-348-2551) or email ([email protected]) your questions, or just listen for tips (and sometimes entertaining questions and answers). You can listen at 90.3 FM in the Albany area or other Northeast Public Radio frequencies. You can also listen live... on-line at the link below (Vox Pop Home Improvement Show). https://www.wamc.org/programs/vox-pop Vox Pop is WAMC's live call-in talk program. Guests with expertise in areas ranging from astronomy to politics speak with WAMC's hosts and answer About this website WAMC.ORG Vox Pop Vox Pop is WAMC's live call-in talk program. Guests with expertise in areas ranging from astronomy to politics speak with WAMC's hosts and answer

In the link below, there is an audio clip of a story I told at a North Country Public Radio event in Glens Falls recently. I intended to tell a different story, but bagged it at the last minute because it didn’t fit the theme well, which was jobs. Thank God they cut most of the story out of the audio clip because I was all over the place and it wasn’t good.

DIGNITY. At times I think I should have my head examined for taking on old fixer-uppers. This one is a solid girl, circa. 1880’s deep in a distressed area of Albany. Alcohol and other drug problems are rampant, particularly on this block. Even with ultra low unemployment, opportunities for some residents are hard to come by for various reasons. After being immersed in the area for a while, I see the problems a little differently and not as simple as just get a job. I co...uld write a short story about all the head-shaking stuff that has gone on, but for the sake of brevity, I will share just one story that made me feel good. There is a lot of stoop sitting in this area. The day before yesterday, I asked a guy sitting on an adjacent stoop pounding tall boys if he wanted to help me paint ours. He said yes (I will call him P). I said, I will see you tomorrow. P said, I will be right here. He was, sleeping at the top of the stoop the next morning when we arrived (pretty sure it was him covered up with a blanket). After getting tools out to start work, P showed up on our stoop. He said he had never painted anything. P was in his late 30’s or 40’s. Hard to believe he had never painted anything. I told him I would teach him how and it was not hard. This was a simple job. He finished the job and it looked pretty good. The wood was protected. You could see the pride and dignity in his face. It was tangible. This was a small matter and it didn’t amount to much, but it was a step in the right direction. One of the best days on the job for me in quite some time.