Part of a large building that was once an anchor of the sprawling Reading Outlet Center complex came crumbling down Thursday.
Rescue crews were dispatched shortly before 11:30 a.m. to the reported collapse at North Ninth and Douglass streets in the city’s old outlet district.
“Inside working and all of a sudden I just heard a big boom,” said Harry Barton. “It feels sort of like a small earthquake.”
The first crews on the scene found that the southwest corner of the former outlet center’s five-story Building 1 had collapsed, causing bricks and other debris to fall onto the streets below.
“Good thing nobody was walking through here or driving,” Barton said. “It could have been very tragic, especially with somebody walking by here. This is a very busy road.”
No one was injured, but at least a dozen cars in the area were damaged by the falling debris, according to fire officials on the scene.
“Not a lot of damage, considering the whole building fell,” said Joel Fischer, whose car was damaged by the collapse. “There’s only some dents here and there.”
The collapse also brought down utility poles and wires.
North Ninth and Douglass streets in the area of the collapse will likely remain closed for the next couple days for cleanup, city officials told 69 News.
In the meantime, a large perimeter has been set up around the building to keep onlookers at a safe distance.
“There’s… freestanding areas that we are concerned about,” said Jeremy Searfoss, Reading’s fire marshal.
Crews are knocking down additional parts of the damaged building. @69News pic.twitter.com/UP1I8kctyT
— Katiera Winfrey WFMZ (@KatieraWFMZ) January 25, 2018 Developer Alan Shuman, who is in the process of demolishing a large chunk of the building, told WFMZ’s Katiera Winfrey that the collapse is likely the result of the building being weakened by the recent freeze/thaw cycle.
“He [the contractor] has been working for the past three months and was to have been completed by now but for delays at City Hall in releasing the permits,” Shuman said.
“The city was asking for a clear plan for how to demolish the building,” said Glenn Steckman, Reading’s managing director. “There was a lot of liability here. We were very concerned and we were doing our due diligence and received a lot of push-back from Mr. Shuman.”
The demolition work is part of Shuman’s decade-long effort to revitalize the city’s old outlet district. Plans call for tearing down about two thirds of the 320,000-square-foot the building.
“This section will now be razed and cleaned up over the next few days, with overall completion expected by the end of March,” Shuman said.
About 80 percent of what’s left of the building is being set aside as retail space.
Building 1 was once home to such stores as Burberry, Kenneth Cole, Nine West, and Guess, as well as the Top of the ROC nightclub and restaurant.