Beyond superstition, 13 floors also offer an opportunity to make money

Johnathan Meade was born on Friday the 13th. A pure coincidence, considering his feelings about the effect of the number in construction.

Meade is the chief operating officer of Meade Engineering, a family-owned engineering services company based in Phoenix. He also has more than a few thoughts on how to make the 13th floor of a building more effective, which is often intentionally designed out of structures due to superstition.

Although the real estate industry has omitted the 13th floor for years for financial and superstitious reasons—hotel travelers and condo buyers often avoid level 13 units, lowering their value—the practice has received pushback from municipalities In 2015, the city of Vancouver, British Columbia, prohibited the omission of these floors on elevator buttons, according to the Vancouver Sun, to avoid confusion when first responders need to find people in an emergency.

Here, Meade talks about his experience, why superstition still dominates building designs, and what can be done to remedy it.

Editor’s Note: This interview has been edited for brevity and clarity.

Construction Immersion: What was your first experience with this internship in the construction industry?

Jonathan Meade: The 44 Monroe Tower in Phoenix, which we worked on in the early 2000s. It doesn’t have a 13th floor. It’s one of those things that, design-wise, is completely owner-driven.

Whoever finances the building, whoever has the vision for the building, is working with the architect. They personally say, “I don’t want to have number 13 in this building.” This becomes a focal point of the design that you will then build.

It not only affects architectural design but will affect all other design disciplines such as mechanical, electrical, structural and civil.

That’s what I think is so interesting about this phobia, which goes back a couple of years, where we’ve literally made decisions around a phobia about how to design something in the construction world.

When I think about it, are these always the best design decisions from an engineering standpoint? Probably not. It probably doesn’t always make sense, but it’s a homeowner’s preference.

How does the 13th floor modification affect the building from a design point of view?

When you build these towers, you have necessary equipment to support the tower, specifically HVAC and mechanical equipment. Many times, the mechanical floor as you call it, will face this floor 13. Sometimes you will have a mechanical key that you will use inside the elevator to access this special floor.

Because of all this equipment on the 13th floor, you will need to modify this floor to accommodate it. The concrete slab may need to be thicker due to the weight of the equipment. It’s not just people and condos.

Maybe the way you route the electrical conduit to power that mechanical equipment will be routed differently and less efficiently as a result of having to get to the 13th floor, instead of putting it on the ground floor or putting on the ground floor. a mechanical yard outside the building.

Those are the kinds of decisions that will affect the whole structure and the way the building is designed, because we have to accommodate that preference.

Why is designating a 13th floor not a potential problem?

If you want to design something luxurious, you will design that building in a particular way. You want to create that atmosphere, create that environment, that will speak to that audience that you’re trying to attract. But the 13th floor is totally superstitious.

If it is a condominium building or a hotel, there is this potential loss of income due to this phobia of the number 13. Condominium values ​​that sell on the 13th floor will be less in demand than the rest of the building, which will then affect the entire building. So there is some financial motivation as well.

As a result of this superstition, I believe we are making design decisions that would otherwise be challenged.

Here’s an example I like to use: I’ve tasked you with creating two identical buildings. In one of them, you have to use floor 13 for your mechanical and electrical equipment. In the other building, you can do whatever you want.

Who will have the most efficient design? Probably the person who can do what they want, if the end goal is to be sustainable or to be efficient with their design. If you think about it that way, that you had to design around the 13th floor, it seems strange.