A Swift Demolition
October 03, 2023
By: Alexa Schlosser
Founded in 1855, Swift & Co. emerged as a prominent Chicago-based company that played a pivotal role in shaping the American meatpacking industry. Its story is intertwined with the growth and development of Chicago as a bustling industrial hub in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
The company stopped slaughtering operations in Chicago in 1953; the once-bustling meatpacking industry has undergone a significant transformation, with new technologies, practices and economic forces reshaping the landscape.
One of Swift & Co.’s buildings was located on South Packers Avenue, one of the last remaining buildings in Chicago’s Union Stock Yards. In 2022, a demolition permit was issued, and on April 19, 2023, NDA member Taylor Excavating & Construction began work taking it down to make way for the future building of another Chicago company, recycling and waste disposal provider LRS.
Taylor Excavating was chosen to perform the demolition due to its experience and specialized demolition equipment, as well as the fact that the company has worked with the general contractor on many projects over the years.
It was a unique demolition due to the building’s height — eight stories and about 145 feet — and construction, which included 12-inch-thick concrete floors and heavy, reinforced columns every 20 feet.
“The reason why it was structurally built like that was because of the weight of the meat stored there,” says Thomas Taylor, owner of Taylor Excavating. “We were one of the few demolition companies left with a demolition crane and ball, which would enable us to knock the building down at that height.”
Chicago has very strict dust control rules, so the project began with Taylor Excavating setting up dust control systems to mitigate dust damage from the demolition.
“There was a lot of preparation to make sure we controlled the dust from the demolition at all times,” Taylor says. “To do that, we had some heavy pumps pumping water up the eight stories, and we had a DustBoss at the bottom. We set up a water system up top so the water was falling down from the building the whole time.”
During windy days, the crew would work on the ground, processing the concrete that had already been knocked down. “If the winds picked up, we wouldn’t demo up high in the air because of the dust,” Taylor says.
The demolition itself started with the Link-Belt crane and wrecking ball on the north end of the building while the Cat 345 high reach and MP20 multi-processor worked on the south end.
“The south end of the building was very close to the neighboring property, so very delicate and precise demolition was involved to avoid any damage to that smaller building,” Taylor says.
The demolished concrete from the building was all processed and prepared on-site with the demolition excavators and prepped for the crushing process. All concrete was crushed into porous granular embankment material and used to backfill the existing basement of the structure.
Ultimately, Taylor says, the demolition job was very successful.
“Our company’s definition of a successful job starts with safety,” Taylor says. “This job was an accident- and injury-free job. All our crews did an exceptional job in a safe manner and brought the job in ahead of schedule.”