February 10, 2020

The Chicago Chapter of the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat (CTBUH) is hosting a panel discussion focused on the newly modernized Chicago Building Code as it relates to high-rise building design.

The event, taking place on Feb. 18, will feature six panelists from the professional community. Each will speak about the effects that the change will have on their specific areas of expertise, including architecture, structural engineering, fire and risk, and sustainability. Our Lori Chandler, AIA, Epsteins Senior Technical Architect, is among the panelists.

Lori was directly involved in the recent overhaul of Chicagos local building codes. Specifically, she was on the Fire/Life Safety technical working group for Phase 2. Phase 2 of the Code Modernization Effort by the city involved preparing recommendations on how to align the core construction, fire protection, renovation, and life safety provisions of the Municipal Code of Chicago with the International Building Code (IBD) and related model codes developed by the International Code of Council (ICC).

We reviewed all of the language for our designated chapters of the working draft, evaluated the difference between that and the current Chicago Building Code, and made changes we thought necessary to best suit the needs in Chicago while still moving towards a more universally accepted model code, Lori said.

Below is the complete list of the panel:

  • Judith Frydland, Building Commissioner City of Chicago
  • Grant Ullrich, Deputy Commissioner City of Chicago
  • Oliver Baumannn (Baumann Consulting): Sustainability
  • Erik Harris (Goettsch Partners): High-Rise Buildings
  • John Viise (Desimone Consulting Engineers): Structural engineering
  • Lori Chandler (Epstein): Architecture
  • Kim Clawson (Wiss, Janney, Elstner Associates, Inc.): Fire life safety
  • Kevin Cahill (WMA): MEP