Work hard, play hard! MC traded calcs for clubs last Friday at Topgolf, Baltimore in appreciation of all the hard work our employees put in.
In the fall of 1983, Frank was discussing with his family if it was the right time to leave his present employer and begin working full time for the firm that he and his brothers had incorporated in July. Two very close friends, Al Rubeling and Ron Morgan, had already started working full time for their new architectural firms and Frank saw this as an opportunity. He pulled the plug, and Morabito Consultants (MC), a full-service structural engineering firm, opened its doors in October of 1983. Their sister Maria, being 7.5 months pregnant, had just quit her job and helped Frank with organizing the office – master specifications, invoices, time sheets, checking accounts, and all the other things necessary to run a successful corporation. MC’s first workspace was set up in 2 bedrooms in Frank’s single-family row home. Their dad built drafting tables from new solid core doors supported by wood frames of 2×4 lumber. MC was up and running – it was an exciting time!
Work came in slowly at first, with house renovations and small commercial projects comprising the bulk of the work. Rubeling & Associates, Becker Morgan Group, and Robert T. Hofmann & Associates started sending design projects, and it was not long before there was enough work to hire MC’s first full-time employee, Andy Fajkowski, to draft the designs; Tony and Fred began working one night a week and Saturdays to help the firm get the design and drawings done on time. Back then, MC did not have the luxury of email, fax, and extensive delivery services. To better service Becker Morgan Group in Salisbury, MC would deliver drawings, specifications and other items using Trailways Bus service – dropping the drawings off at the terminal in Baltimore at noon, Trailways would deliver the drawings to Salisbury by 3:00 p.m. This allowed MC to meet our client’s needs and produce quality contract documents in a timely manner.
In May 1984, MC opened its first office at 2125 Maryland Avenue. Fred began working full time for MC in June and Tony followed in October. Soon after, Maryland Industrial Enterprises (now St. John Properties), Cochran Stephenson & Donkervoet, Brown Worrall & Johnson, and Meyers & D’Aleo started feeding us new design office buildings, distribution centers, tilt-up warehouses, schools – and we had a full workload.
Construction is moving along smoothly at the 105,000 square foot 7-story Arundel Preserve self-storage building in Hanover, Maryland. 40-inch-tall composite steel transfer girders have been installed to clear span over the drive-in areas that will ultimately support 6 levels of storage level and roof framing. Structural framing is scheduled to be completed in summer of 2023.
Reconstruction of Pool #1 at the Grove Isle condominium complex is moving along swimmingly in Coconut Grove South Miami. Pool #1 recreation deck is one of the last major restoration phases of the beautiful and sprawling 150,000 square-foot landscaping and recreation plazas. Morabito Consultants is proud to serve as structural engineer of record, waterproofing and remediation consultant, and threshold inspector for this enormous concrete repair and landscaping improvement project. The plaza and pool structures had suffered decades of substantial deterioration and required extensive restoration and strengthening to accommodate new concrete and landscaping features. Construction of the multi-phased project commenced in 2018 and completion is expected in the Fall 2023.
Brightview Dulles Corner is officially open! Congratulations to Brightview Senior Living and the design/construction team for another successful community. As always, it’s been a pleasure partnering with Hord Coplan Macht, Bowman Consulting, and Donohoe Construction Company, and Dewberry.
MC provided structural engineering services for the new facility located at Innovation Center Station in Herndon, VA which consists of 230,000 square-feet over seven floors. Structural systems include six levels of Hambro slab supported by a two-way flat plate at the second level.
#SeniorLiving #GrandOpening #CompletedConstruction #StructuralEngineering
MC would like to wish our associates, colleagues, and families a safe and Happy Easter! Our office will be closed today, Friday April 7th to allow extended time for our associates to spend with their families and will reopen for normal business hours on Monday, April 10th.
Being an expert at concrete remediation demands equal experience designing those same structures. During a recent routine condition review of a parking structure, column cracks were immediately identified by Morabito Consultants (MC) as being a symptom of a design flaw often found in post-tensioned (PT) beam to column joints. MC identified the potential for this type of cracking over 30 years ago and has been performing design and detailing to ensure that our PT beam-column joints do not crack in this manner. The cost to properly repair this design flaw is both intrusive and expensive. Quite often engineers and repair contractors will specify and install rigid epoxy injection as the only repair solution for these cracks, of which will inevitably fail.
MC would like to wish our staff and colleagues a Happy Engineers Week!
Earlier this month, we had the privilege to be a sponsor for the Baltimore Museum of Industry (BMI) 2023 Wood Bridge Challenge. Local high school students competed to build the most “efficient” basswood and glue bridge to span a one-foot gap. The most efficient bridge is one that carries the most load, relative to its own weight (Load/Bridge Weight). On behalf of MC, Senior Engineer, Robert Miller attended the event, and his 6-year-old son was able to test out his own bridge which held nearly 200 lbs. The future of MC looks promising!
If you know of any aspiring engineers, BMI has other engineering challenges coming up for students in grades 1-12 which you can find on their website. Help us build the future of engineering today!
It’s official, Howard County’s High School #13 has been named Guilford Park High School! The 289,000 square-foot educational facility is designed to achieve a minimum LEED Silver designation and construction is on track to wrap up in August 2023, just in time for the new school year to begin.
