Where Is The Rust Belt?

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by eschaton

Brick also doesn't need to be painted. This is the main reason why wood structures deteriorate so much more rapidly than brick ones. As long as a roof is intact, a brick building can stay vacant for decades and be brought back no problem, but more than 10 years without a paint job on a wood house and the whole structure starts to rapidly deteriorate.

yeah, a true masonry building shell (not brick veneer) can stand up against the vagaries of time much better than wood frame construction can.

Case in point: the 100 year old brick 3-flat I live in.

According to neighborhood lore, back in the '90s our 3-flat was the "drug house" of the block. It had fallen into such neglect and disrepair that broken windows on the top floor unit never got repaired, letting in water that eventually led to rot of the structural floor framing.

When it was purchased by a flipper in 2000, as the neighborhood was gentrifying, it had no working mechanical, electrical, or plumbing systems, and with rot setting in in some of the structural floor framing, a complete rebuild was in order.

But because it was a vintage chicago 3-flat built in 1920 with a 3-wythe solid brick masonry shell, the flipper was able to save that and build a modern brand new 3-flat, with brand new MEP systems, within that masonry shell.

Had it been a wood-frame 3-flat in a similar condition, it almost certainly would've gone full demo.

So we get to live in a modern home, with modern MEP systems, but from the street it looks like the same exact brick 3-flat that was here back when my great-grandparents lived in the neighborhood a century ago.

Originally Posted by pj3000

Your energy efficiency claim is not true.

if we're talking just brick versus just wood and not all the other crap in the walls, i think it's mostly true. brick generally has a slightly higher thermal conductivity (per thickness per Kelvin) than wood, but brick walls are usually much thicker than wood walls, which compensates for the difference in thermal conductivity.

[Steely Dan]

^ neither brick nor wood have particularly high R-values by themselves. The lion's share of any wall construction's thermal performance comes from the insulation used.

A true 2 or 3 wythe brick wall does have some thermal mass advantages for storing thermal energy (ie. soaking up the warmth of the day and holding some of it for the chilly night ahead), but a frame wall comes with the advantage of stud cavity space that is easily filled with batt or foam insulation.

Of course, you can always insulate behind a traditional masonry load bearing wall as well, but that just makes an already thick exterior wall construction even thicker.

That's the case with our 3-flat: 12" of solid brick + 2-1/2" furring with foam insulation + 5/8" interior gyp board = total wall thickness of 15-1/8".

A normal wood frame house with 2x6's + 1/2" exterior plywood sheathing + 5/8" interior gyp board = total wall thickness 6-5/8" + the thickness of whatever siding you slap on the outside of the sheathing.

That's a difference of 8-1/2".

[pj3000]

Originally Posted by IWant2BeInSTL

if we're talking just brick versus just wood and not all the other crap in the walls, i think it's mostly true. brick generally has a slightly higher thermal conductivity (per thickness per Kelvin) than wood, but brick walls are usually much thicker than wood walls, which compensates for the difference in thermal conductivity.

We’re not talking about the sole material, brick vs. wood. We’re talking about structures (houses).

You claimed that “maintained brick structures are more energy-efficient”... and that is not true. It’s not nearly that simple.

Originally Posted by pj3000

We’re not talking about the sole material, brick vs. wood. We’re talking about structures (houses).

that's kind-of why i made the point about wall thickness compensating for brick's slightly lower thermal conductivity. brick exterior walls have to bear way more load than wood-frame walls. as such, they're typically 12" thick or more. whereas, wood-frame exterior walls consist of spaced, 2" studs covered by 1" or 2" thick planks.

Originally Posted by pj3000

You claimed that “maintained brick structures are more energy-efficient”... and that is not true. It’s not nearly that simple.

fine: all other things being equal, it's that simple. i'm not comparing a bare brick box to a fully insulated wood-frame house, or 150 year-old brick and plaster to modern insulating material. if you take a well maintained historic brick home as-built and a well-maintained historic wood-frame home of comparable size as-built, the brick home will more than likely have a higher thermal lag than the wood-frame home. that is, given a temperature differential between the interior and exterior, the brick home maintains its interior temperature longer than the wood-frame home.

[CaliNative]

"Rust Belt" can be anywhere where you have industrial decay. Abandoned factory buildings, vacant office buildings, high unemployment and poverty. It doesn't have to be in midwestern it eastern cities. There are western and southern examples as well. Butte, Pueblo, Bisbee, Nogales, Ely, Taft, Birmingham (yes, some of these places are coming back). Many smaller farm towns everywhere are depopulating as mechanization and corporatization of farms reduces the need for small market towns. The wheat belt in the Great Plains has especially lost these towns. Some have been almost abandoned. Nothing more desolate and depressing than a dying or abandoned town. The old mining "ghost towns" of the west are the rust belt prototype. The excellent film "The Last Picture Show" covers the human wreckage in a dying west Texas town.

[pj3000]

^ it’s a bit different in terms of scale in the Midwest/northeastern US.

These places were among the largest industrial centers of production in the world, which made the massive collapses and long slow bleeds much more dramatic. Because of that scale and concentration, the enormous wealth generated, and the devastating collapse, the area had unfortunately earned the moniker to a far greater extent than disparate centers of production in the west and south.

[CaliNative]

Originally Posted by pj3000

^ it’s a bit different in terms of scale in the Midwest/northeastern US.

These places were among the largest industrial centers of production in the world, which made the massive collapses and long slow bleeds much more dramatic. Because of that scale and concentration, the enormous wealth generated, and the devastating collapse, the area had unfortunately earned the moniker to a far greater extent than disparate centers of production in the west and south.

True. The scale is different. How about the old industrial centers in Europe? A lot of "rust belt" feel there. North England (the midlands), the Ruhr, south Belgium, parts of eastern Germany, Czech Rep. etc.

[pj3000]

Originally Posted by IWant2BeInSTL

fine: all other things being equal, it's that simple. i'm not comparing a bare brick box to a fully insulated wood-frame house, or 150 year-old brick and plaster to modern insulating material. if you take a well maintained historic brick home as-built and a well-maintained historic wood-frame home of comparable size as-built, the brick home will more than likely have a higher thermal lag than the wood-frame home. that is, given a temperature differential between the interior and exterior, the brick home maintains its interior temperature longer than the wood-frame home.

I understand what you're saying, just basing it on thermal conductivity properties of materials alone. If you have two of the exact same structures in the same place right next to each other, an un-insulated brick shell vs. an un-insulated wood shell... then, yes, the brick shell with higher thermal mass is going to resist heat transfer more than the wood shell.

But this is really just a steady-state, "in the lab" scenario. Actual rates of heat flow through a building envelope are not constant due to varying conditions found in the real world, and thus materials with higher thermal mass can exhibit greater variation in their levels of thermal performance.

And a house's energy performance is determined by far more than the thermal resistance of a material/thermal conduction through exterior walls. That is just one component of building energy efficiency.

[lio45]

Originally Posted by eschaton

The issue with wood housing is if you get one owner who wants to "modernize" - or a rental owner who doesn't give a crap - they rip off all of the historic wood trim, slap on some vinyl siding, and uglify the hell out of it.

Here in Pittsburgh, it can be even worse, because in the mid-20th century homeowners liked to replace tall Victorian windows with more "modern" horizontal sliders, totally ruining the proportions of the facades.

A brick building is simply much harder/more expensive to ruin. The most common form of remuddling I see is tearing off front porches, but otherwise they're generally left intact even if they go downscale.

pj3000 beat me to it, but at least in my neck of the woods (Quebec), no one, no matter how stupid or misguided as owner/landlord, ever ripped off the original 1800s wood siding. It's always there, under whatever covers it (vinyl, aluminum, shingles that imitate brick, etc.)

[pj3000]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

The lion's share of any wall construction's thermal performance comes from the insulation used.

True... in a way. As with everything in building energy performance, it depends.

Insulation without proper air sealing is akin to going out in freezing temps, wearing only a cable-knit sweater, with no layer underneath and no windbreaker over top. It's not going to do much in terms of keeping you warm.

[lio45]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

yeah, a true masonry building shell (not brick veneer) can stand up against the vagaries of time much better than wood frame construction can.

Case in point: the 100 year old brick 3-flat I live in.

According to neighborhood lore, back in the '90s our 3-flat was the "drug house" of the block. It had fallen into such neglect and disrepair that broken windows on the top floor unit never got repaired, letting in water that eventually led to rot of the structural floor framing.

When it was purchased by a flipper in 2000, as the neighborhood was gentrifying, it had no working mechanical, electrical, or plumbing systems, and with rot setting in in some of the structural floor framing, a complete rebuild was in order.

But because it was a vintage chicago 3-flat built in 1920 with a 3-wythe solid brick masonry shell, the flipper was able to save that and build a modern brand new 3-flat, with brand new MEP systems, within that masonry shell.

Had it been a wood-frame 3-flat in a similar condition, it almost certainly would've gone full demo.

So we get to live in a modern home, with modern MEP systems, but from the street it looks like the same exact brick 3-flat that was here back when my great-grandparents lived in the neighborhood a century ago.

Isn't this a four-flat? The bottom unit being halfway in the ground (with no basement) is a very common style in northern climates.

Our family friend's Montreal triplex that I almost bought last year looks almost like the twin of your building, except minus the top (I'd call it "fourth") story.

[shappy]

Hope this isn't too stupid of a question, but where is the front door of the apartment in that ^ pic? At first I thought you walk down a few steps but then noticed there is no path down there and a garden blocking that lower section. Is it around the sides? Doesn't look like there would be room... I'm confused!!

[The North One]

California actually has a higher official poverty rate than I think any state in the Midwest, they also have an even higher supplemental poverty rate

So if that's a characteristic of rustbelt, then California is clearly a rustbelt state.

[lio45]

Originally Posted by shappy

Hope this isn't too stupid of a question, but where is the front door of the apartment in that ^ pic? At first I thought you walk down a few steps but then noticed there is no path down there and a garden blocking that lower section. Is it around the sides? Doesn't look like there would be room... I'm confused!!

There's room around the sides... for a 1920s American, though maybe not a 500-pound modern one :p :p

[dc_denizen]

Originally Posted by The North One

California actually has a higher official poverty rate than I think any state in the Midwest, they also have an even higher supplemental poverty rate

So if that's a characteristic of rustbelt, then California is clearly a rustbelt state.

That’s because the poor people moved to other states

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by pj3000

True... in a way. As with everything in building energy performance, it depends.

Insulation without proper air sealing is akin to going out in freezing temps, wearing only a cable-knit sweater, with no layer underneath and no windbreaker over top. It's not going to do much in terms of keeping you warm.

Yes, true. I was inexact with my wording.

I should have said that the lion's share of any wall's R-value comes from the insulation.

Brick, wood, stone, metals, concrete, etc, don't do a whole lot of insulating by themselves.

Overall thermal performance is dependent on many other variables, as you pointed out.


I grew up in a wood frame stucco bungalow built in 1914 without insulation, and I've also lived in vintage chicago 3-wythe masonry buildings without insulation.

between the two options, i'd take the brick building. BUT, wood frame at least gives you the stud cavity to do blow-in insulation as a retrofit option, which my dad eventually did have done to my childhood home. with a traditional masonry wall, you ain't getting insulation in there without completely ripping out the existing plaster and lathe on the inside of all exterior walls and furring out with new construction ($$$$).

Originally Posted by lio45

Isn't this a four-flat? The bottom unit being halfway in the ground (with no basement) is a very common style in northern climates.

it was built as a 3-flat. many 2 and 3 flats had garden units added to their basements (often times illegally), but the 2 and 3 flat designation refers to the number of fully above ground floors.

in the case of our building, and many, many other rehabbed flat buildings, the basement level has been completely finished and combined with the 1st floor unit to make a fairly large 2-floor unit, known in the chicago real estate market as a "duplex down" unit.

Originally Posted by shappy

Hope this isn't too stupid of a question, but where is the front door of the apartment in that ^ pic? At first I thought you walk down a few steps but then noticed there is no path down there and a garden blocking that lower section. Is it around the sides? Doesn't look like there would be room... I'm confused!!

there's room on the far side in the gap between our building and our neighboring building to the east.

the front door to the building is labelled as "entry" on the "first floor" plan below.

it's recessed fairly deeply into the plan, so when you enter our home from the front, you do so kinda in the middle of the unit.

[JManc]

Your first floor layout seems pretty standard for those Chicago style flats. Your kitchen is huge compared to what I've seen though.

[Crawford]

Originally Posted by The North One

California actually has a higher official poverty rate than I think any state in the Midwest, they also have an even higher supplemental poverty rate

This is obviously untrue. California has one of the lowest poverty rates in the U.S.

And the Rustbelt states don't have particularly high poverty rates either. States like MI and OH are pretty middle-of-the-pack.

[eschaton]

Originally Posted by Crawford

This is obviously untrue. California has one of the lowest poverty rates in the U.S.

And the Rustbelt states don't have particularly high poverty rates either. States like MI and OH are pretty middle-of-the-pack.

Maybe he was referring to something like the ratio of wages to cost of living?