Section: LIFE & LEISURE Page: G1

Sunday, December 9, 2001

RAISING THE ROOF THE RESTORATION OF THE SPRAWLING TOP OF THE CAPITOL WILL AT LONG LAST CLOSE OUT THE LEAKS AND LET IN THE LIGHT

PAUL GRONDAHL STAFF WRITER

ALBANY Atop the riotous jumble of brooding granite gutters, gaudy terra-cotta gables and acres of prosaic slate that make up the roof of the state Capitol, an unexpected serenity emerges 190 feet above Washington Avenue.

The din of downtown traffic is a muted whisper. On a clear and windless fall afternoon, a panoramic view unfolds 100 miles in any direction and 100 years back in time.

There is no distracting flutter of urban pigeons on the roof. Hungry red-tailed hawks that nest at this lofty height take care of that.

From ground level, the public can't fathom that something so seemingly mundane as a roof can be so breathtakingly vast, so astonishingly intricate. Thirty skilled workers toil daily on the $8.23 million, first phase of the Capitol roof rehabilitation scheduled to take eight years and four phases to complete to perform the first major overhaul in a century on the colossal covering.

``You can't convey the scope and complexity of this project until you see it up close,'' says James Jamieson, state Capitol architect for the past four years and a walking encyclopedia of Capitolana.

Just the cost of renting and erecting the sprawling scaffolding for the roof restoration is $1.2 million.

From the tip of the tallest finial 220 feet above State Street, the monumental building that has been called ``one of the most lavish structures produced in 19th-century America'' looms as if a gargantuan candle were left to melt and drip over a multitiered wedding cake.

A marble monolith

The Capitol is designated a National Historic Landmark and is considered by architectural critics to be one of the finest state capitols in the land.

It wasn't always regarded as such. The Capitol took 32 years and $25 million to complete, a long-running construction debacle that exceeded budget and missed deadlines so extravagantly that Gov. Frank S. Black in 1897 described the marble monolith as ``an affliction from which time affords but little hope of relief.''

The Capitol, plagued by internecine politics and the wrangling of its multiple architects, was never finished.

Construction, much of it still on the drawing boards, was essentially abandoned.

As one of his first official acts, Gov. Theodore Roosevelt who campaigned on cutting state waste and corraling corruption declared the building ``complete'' on Feb. 4, 1899. Roosevelt froze any further construction spending and canned the Capitol architect.

A visit to the roof confirms the convoluted epic involved in the construction of the building and the arduous task of restoring it.

Problems showed up as soon as Roosevelt pulled the plug 102 years ago.

``From day one, the roof leaked like a sieve,'' says Jamieson.

Since the original granite roof gutters seemed to be the problem, the Legislature, after acrimonious debate, agreed to spend more and add copper gutters. Rain still seeped through, though, causing extensive water damage to the Capitol's interior. Slipshod stopgap repairs were tried over the decades.

The current full-scale restoration is the first time major portions of the leaky roof have been properly repaired since Teddy Roosevelt was governor.

Precise work

Replicating the original roofing materials is a major challenge. To begin with, 274 uniquely different kinds of tiles make up the sprawling roof structure. Each replacement must be made by hand.

Consider how the massive terra-cotta ridge roof tiles, each weighing as much as 80 pounds, many of which are cracked or broken, are replicated. The originals are numbered, measured, photographed and removed. A wooden duplicate is made to produce a plaster negative.

At a terra-cotta tile plant in Ohio, one of just a few left in the United States, a dull, gray clay is placed in the plaster negative form and allowed to dry for 96 hours. The clay is fired at 2,000 degrees for 14 days and turns a warm red as the iron content is drawn out in the heating.

That process is repeated hundreds of times for terra-cotta replacements.

Layers of waterproof rubber and copper flashing are laid down before the replicated tiles are re-attached.

The heavy lifting truly begins with the monumental granite roof gutters. The gutters are ornamentally rich with carved flowers, seashells and stylized weights. The gutter sections weigh as much as 3,500 pounds. Perched at dizzying heights, laborers muscle the granite gutters into place using chains and pulleys.

As they go, workers install beneath the granite gutters a rubber membrane, copper flashing and larger drains.

``This gives us two new lines of defense to stop the leaks,'' Jamieson says. ``This should last 100 years without leaking. No, this will last 100 years without a leak.''

Workers re-attach the gutters with historically accurate mortar. They drill and bolt the granite sections to the building's skeleton using heavy stainless steel rods. The gutters, for the most part, had rested there for decades without being firmly connected to the building. ``We want to fix it all correctly this time, because we don't want to come back to do it for a long, long time,'' the Capitol architect says.

It's grinding, costly work, yet necessary to stop further interior water damage.

``Some might not consider a roof terribly exciting, but it's essential for solving the problem with leaks, since it's a building essentially built to last forever,'' says John G. Waite, an Albany architect who worked on the restoration of the Capitol's Red Room, Senate and Assembly chambers over the past two decades. Last year, he was appointed to the state Commission on the Restoration of the Capitol.

``The roof is not only a monumental architectural feature of the Capitol, but it's an important document that lays out the rich mosaic of the building's past and the history of the state,'' Waite says.

Historic symbol

The massive stone structure has settled over more than a century. Engineers, for example, have determined that the huge, ornately carved stone dormers on the Assembly chamber side roofline lean 4 inches out into Washington Avenue.

Although the leaning dormers are not considered an immediate hazard, they will be repaired and brought back to their original position in phase two of the roof restoration project.

Given the multibillion-dollar loss of tax revenues in the wake of the destruction of the World Trade Center's twin towers in the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, Gov. George Pataki warns that all state spending, including the Capitol restoration, will face added scrutiny.

``A lot we'd planned to do and would like to do will have to be deferred,'' Pataki says. ``We're going forward, but projects like the Capitol might take a little longer.''

Pataki has taken a personal interest in the project and is fond of the fact that he is closing the historical circle around his political idol Teddy Roosevelt.

``It's a symbol that you don't care about the state's history when you allow a great landmark like the Capitol to decline,'' Pataki says. ``I love reading about the history of the Capitol, and I've worked hard to help preserve it.''

On his watch, Pataki has approved funding for restoration of the Assembly chamber, the Dodge murals in the so-called War Room, the Governor's Reception Room and $1 million for exterior lighting and several other smaller projects.

``Governor Pataki's interest in the building is obviously strong,'' Waite says.

Natural light

While the tile-by-tile roof restoration crawls ahead through all seasons, the most dramatic and visible improvement of phase one is nearing completion.

For the first time in more than 50 years, natural light soon will pour into the Million-Dollar Staircase through a spectacular interior laylight and exterior skylight. The glass was covered in the 1940s to defend against potential nighttime air attacks in World War II, according to undocumented lore.

The 2,600-square-foot centerpiece laylight is a glass dome with 192 panes of textured glass cloaked by graceful copper-finish framing ribs reminiscent of a Victorian greenhouse.

The laylight, which acts as a light diffuser, rests about 40 feet above the fourth-floor landing of the stairwell. It required complete restoration, including reproduction of each pane of glass (many were cracked or damaged) and extensive work on the ribs.

The 3,000-square-foot skylight, which had been covered with slate roofing tiles, also is being restored. The 3/4-inch insulated clear glass is being fabricated. The old glass was beyond repair.

The skylight and laylight restoration should be completed in spring.

The ornately carved stone staircase (also scheduled to receive a $1 million cleaning and restoration) will be brightly illuminated once again as the original architects intended.

Current light readings in the stairwell measure about seven foot candles, comparable to a dim home interior.

Lighting engineers predict the light readings in the stairway will jump a hundredfold, to as bright as 700 foot candles (like a day at the beach) when the skylight and laylight are restored and uncovered.

``It will be very dramatic,'' Jamieson says. ``Historical accounts show that this stairway was described as very light and bright when the Capitol opened.''

Randall Sawyer, a spokesman for the state Office of General Services, quips: ``You might want to think about wearing sunglasses inside.''

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