Page 19 - Georgia Forestry - Issue 1 - Winter 2022

There’s no disputing the glam factor of tall buildings con- structed with mass timber. Georgians who do a quick internet search for Georgia Tech’s Kendeda Building for Innovative Sustainable Design, or the T3 West Midtown, will find press coverage of the stunning, wood-forward buildings to be both rhapsodic and profuse. The same goes for a cross-laminated timber (CLT) project that isn’t even finished yet: the 500,000-square-foot expansion of Ponce City Market.
But members of the forestry commu- nity who’ve followed the potential of mass timber — from cross-laminated to dowel- or nail-laminated, from Glulam to laminated veneer lumber — might be for- given for wondering, is that all there is?
Thanks to a number of exciting devel- opments in the mass timber construction market, the answer is a resounding no. In fact, national growth is already hap- pening exponentially, according to Bill Parsons, vice president of operations at WoodWorks, a non-profit that provides free project support and education to designers, engineers and builders who want to work with wood.
“In 2015, WoodWorks provided support on a handful of projects where the team had an interest in mass timber,” Parsons reports. “Now, there are more than 1,200 mass timber projects in design, under construction or built across
the U.S.”
The year 2015 was, of course, when CLT was added to the International Building Code (IBC), opening the door for U.S. mass timber construction on a broader scale. (An Austrian invention, CLT construction has been growing in Europe since the late 1990s.) Subsequent IBC updates progressively increased the number of stories allowed to be built with mass timber. That number has now reached 18 stories.
In a significant move for Georgia builders and wood producers, in 2020 the Georgia Legislature passed a bill (since signed into law) allowing up to 18 mass timber stories to be built here as well. To seal the deal, the Georgia Department of Community Affairs voted in November 2021 to amend the latest IBC with tall mass timber provisions.
Parsons translates all these regulatory machinations simply: “Design and construction teams are no longer limited to six stories of wood and they don’t need special approval to go higher. It makes it easier to move these innovative projects from concept to completion.”
REGULATORY CHANGES SPUR DEVELOPMENT
For developers, architects and builders who want to create tall buildings with mass timber, such smoothing of the bureaucratic works is a huge motivator.
“The ball is rolling faster now,” con- firms Bryan Harder, a Savannah-based architect and project manager with LS3P Associates. “And it’s going to pick up speed — like rolling a bowling ball down ahill—onceonecanwalktoasiteand experience it.”
Harder is helping to make this happen in Savannah with his current project for Flank, Inc. — a multi-family residential building at 111 Ann Street at the edge of the historic district. Harder reports that ground has already broken, vertical con- struction should begin this February and the project will be completed in the spring. It’s the first mass timber building for both Savannah and for his firm, and Harder says the learning curve for all involved has been steep but exhilarating.
“It’s very exciting to get in on the ground level of this movement,” he says. “In Savannah, we have 100-year-old buildings that are essentially made of heavy timber. So, we’re coming full circle, seeing a modernized version of that.”
For consumers, Parsons says the pandemic has been another catalyst for increased interest in mass timber. After a quarantine experience in which people spent more time in nature, worked in their homes and became more aware of climate change, many are loath to return to a steel-and-concrete office with a drop ceiling.
“The sustainable movement has gotten stronger,” he says. “People want to go back to a healthier environment, what they feel good in.”
Harder agrees: “The pandemic has definitely shifted attention to more outdoor space in public and apartment buildings, more public and private patios — where people can be outside and be safe.”
But Harder says this connection to nature has also given workers and dwellers an increasing urge to bring the outside in.
“Biophilic design,” he explains, “makes people more connected with
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