Maloney Properties engaged Code Red Consultants to design a retrofit fire alarm system as well as a retrofit sprinkler system in a residential building located at 89 Union Park Street in Boston. The six-story building contains mostly apartments with some offices and assembly areas, and needed to remain occupied throughout the retrofit. Further, the existing fire alarm and fire sprinkler systems needed to remain in a working manner while the new fire alarm and sprinkler systems were retrofit in parallel.

During the fire sprinkler system installation, it was determined that the existing building contained numerous concealed combustible spaces above the ceilings. Code Red Consultants devised various sprinkler system approaches from NFPA 13 Section 8.15 to apply to these spaces, including sprinklering them, removing the concealed combustible spaces, and reducing the size and location of these spaces to eliminate the need for sprinkler protection.

Code Red Consultants utilized the code requirements in NFPA 13 to propose a novel solution to the concealed combustible spaces. The client will realize large cost savings over time by Code Red Consultants’ code approach relative to the removal of specific fire protection systems that were once part of the existing fire alarm system.