The offer by Toll Brothers to repair the fire-damaged roof of the Naval Home immediately may be thwarted by the red tape of the Historic Preservation Do Gooders. The result may be a considerable extra cost -- both in having to put up a temporary roof now and replace it later, as well as in researching the details nobody but a pedant would notice as the difference between what was there before the fire and what might have been there the day the building was first opened.
Here's the story from today's Inquirer.
Al Krigman
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Toll Bros. proposes to repair roof now
The firm says a replacement covering at the Naval Home could be done quickly. The city wants an analysis first.
By Stephan Salisbury
Inquirer Staff Writer
Toll Bros. made a surprise offer yesterday to immediately restore the roof of the landmark U.S. Naval Home, ravaged by an arson blaze last month.
At a hearing before Municipal Court Judge Seamus P. McCaffery, John McDonald, a Toll Bros. executive, said a permanent roof could be put up as quickly as the temporary covering the city has proposed.
The Huntingdon Valley developer, owner of the 20.3-acre site at Grays Ferry Avenue and 24th Street since 1988, has been accused of "demolition by neglect" by the city Department of Licenses and Inspections.
"We are going to create a roof that's true in appearance to the roof in 1846," McDonald told McCaffery.
Andrew Ross, senior Law Department attorney, said the city "would be thrilled" if a permanent, historically correct roof could be built for Biddle Hall, the damaged centerpiece of the three-building complex.
But, Ross said, Toll Bros. has not completed a historic-structure analysis of the building, which would determine how the appearance was modified over time. Without such an assessment, he said, an 1846 roof might ultimately prove inappropriate.
Ross also said that materials and manner of construction must be replicated with any historic restoration.
"What this building is going to require is 'true,' not 'true in appearance,' " Ross said.
"It's a National Register building, so it's got to be restored" accurately, James C. Campbell, of Campbell, Thomas & Co. Architects, said after the hearing. Toll Bros. hired Campbell to work on the project.
The new roof, Campbell said, would "be identical to what was there."
Toll Bros. attorneys said a historic-structure analysis would be complete within a month.
"I think everybody would like to see [the roof] replaced," neighborhood resident Ann Hoskins-Brown said after the hearing. "I wasn't clear on what they meant, though. From the outside, it was just an old, tin roof. But from the inside, it was pretty dramatic."
The Greek Revival Naval Home, designed in 1827 and modified repeatedly over the years, was the first home for the U.S. Naval Academy, as well as the first Navy retirement home. It is a certified national and local historic landmark.
Toll Bros. acquired an option on the property in 1982 and completed the purchase six years later for $1.2 million. Since then, the company has built nothing, but about a decade ago it demolished Laning Hall, an 1868 building designed by John MacArthur, architect of City Hall. That building was deemed too deteriorated to restore.
McCaffery, who has been prodding Toll Bros. and the city to move quickly before more damage is done to the complex, urged city officials to expedite the cumbersome process governing historic-building construction permits. He set another hearing on the matter for April 2.
