After terrace collapse at Allure in Stamford, BLT tenants seek answers as anxiety mounts

Lewandowski has swapped tales with others about surface cracks in some walls at Allure and dripping water on certain garage floors, previously minor annoyances which now prompt concerned speculation in online chats.

BLT declined to comment on specific concerns from residents, but company spokesman Rob Blanchard said, “We take any resident concern very seriously and have a highly responsive and dedicated team on site to address any issue. We encourage any residents to share any questions or issues they may have with our team.”

‘No obvious risks’ ahead

BLT’s message in the weeks since has stayed consistent. Building management at Allure, in at least four emails to residents since Feb. 1, has emphasized that the building is stable and that internal and external investigations are underway.

City officials also maintain that the building continues to be safe for residents.

“No obvious risks have been detected,” according to a statement put out by Stamford’s Operations Department after the partial terrace collapse.

BLT has retained structural engineering firm Henderson Rodgers, based out of Houston, Texas, to evaluate the conditions at Allure. City officials have also hired engineers from Wiss, Janney, Elstner Associates Inc. to perform an “independent forensic investigation of the causes” of the collapse.

Early comments from Henderson Rodgers sketch out a rough picture of what happened at the parking garage. A Feb. 2 letter from the firm written to BLT’s construction head describes the collapsed floor, or “local slab failure,” as an issue that does not compromise the “global stability” of the property.

Slab failure broadly refers to cracks in the concrete that impact structural integrity: “Failures might be due to deficient design or construction, or to inadequate maintenance, but most are due to excessive loading,” according to a 2017 article from Structure Magazine.

Henderson Rodgers recommended BLT install temporary support beams throughout the impacted region. After the terrace collapse, floor-to-ceiling poles appeared in parking spots and next to concrete columns on the affected floor.

Regardless of the cause, BLT will have to rebuild parts of the parking garage, experts said. Stamford officials say they will closely follow that process.

“They’re not permitted to remove and rebuild (the garage) until we issue the (building) permit,” city Operations Director Matt Quinones said. The Stamford Board of Representatives is also slated to discuss Allure at its next Public Safety Committee meeting on Tuesday.

BLT told residents in a Friday email that it “anticipates that this repair work will commence shortly.”

Stay or go?

Though building management has communicated in emails that “engineers are confident that the issue is limited to this specific area and have designed a plan for repair,” the communications still feel sparse, some residents said.

Allure resident Katie — who asked to be identified only by her first name out of concerns about her lease — has avoided jumping to many conclusions: “I’m not an engineer,” she said — but that doesn’t mean she’s not worried.

Katie said she and her fiancee never planned to stay at Allure long after tying the knot — they plan to marry over the summer — and figured they would start house-hunting afterward.

But when the terrace caved in, staying in the building for almost another year seemed like too long, the 28-year-old said. Her unease about the safety of the building lingered and she quickly set her sights on a move-out date in early March, she said.

“If our lease honestly was ending in like April, May, even maybe June, I think we would have had more of a ‘Let’s just stick it out until then’ mentality,” she said.

But Katie also characterized her decision to break the lease as atypical. Most of the people she knows will stay until their leases end before exploring other options, she said.

Allure resident Maris Cohen falls in that second group. Cohen raised alarms on social media when she saw parts of the terrace had collapsed, but terminating her lease feels like a step too far, she said.

“Frankly, moving is a pain,” she said. But she and her partner plan to start looking at condos in Stamford in June when their lease ends, especially if the company raises rent in response to the housing market, she said.

As for Lewandowski, she said she plans to leave Allure, where she’s lived since relocating from Nashville in 2020, in April. And she knows at least seven other residents terminating their leases after the terrace collapse, she said.

The it wasn’t the only reason she wants to leave, just another straw: In her two years living at Allure, Lewandowski has leveled many complaints against management.

While some are more everyday maintenance flaws, Lewandowski points to persistent water leaks from her apartment window during January 2021 as an example of problems she’s had while living in Allure. Construction workers visited her ninth-floor apartment and installed a new window, which she said was improperly put in in the first place.

BLT declined to comment on specific concerns from residents like Lewandowski.

Lewandowski spends about $4,600 a month for her two-bedroom corner unit at Allure, she said.

After a year and a half of frustrations, it feels like too much, she said.

“It’s $3,000 more than what I was paying in Nashville,” Lewandowski said.