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Moving a really big house


zork

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If you think that is cool, check out the Wikipedia article about the raising of Chicago.

An excerpt:

Many of central Chicago’s hurriedly-erected wooden frame buildings were now considered inappropriate to the burgeoning and increasingly wealthy city. Rather than raise them several feet, proprietors often preferred to relocate these old frame buildings, replacing them with new masonry blocks built to the latest grade. Consequently, the practice of putting the old multi-story, intact and furnished wooden buildings—sometimes entire rows of them en bloc—on rollers and moving them to the outskirts of town or to the suburbs was so common as to be considered nothing more than routine traffic. Traveller David Macrae wrote, “Never a day passed during my stay in the city that I did not meet one or more houses shifting their quarters. One day I met nine. Going out Great Madison Street in the horse cars we had to stop twice to let houses get across.” The function for which such a building had been constructed would often be maintained during the move. A family could begin dining at one address and end their meal at another, and a shop owner could keep their shop open, even as customers had to climb in through a moving front door.[34][35][36][37][38] Brick buildings also were moved from one location to another, and in 1866, the first of these—a brick building of two and a half stories—made the short move from Madison Street out to Monroe Street.[39] Later, many other much larger brick buildings were rolled much greater distances across Chicago.[40]

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I just bought an office building </humblebrag> that was originally built in 1907, and it was moved form Taylor, Texas to Jollyville Road in Austin back in 1986. I’ve been trying to find info about the move, one of the long time tenants says it was in the newspaper. No luck so far. 
 

We have been renovating and had some good  and bad surprises. One of the good surprises was that the 100+ year old hardwood floors that were covered up by plywood and carpet by the previous owners were in good condition and we were able the refinish them. That also allowed us to see exactly where they had but the building in half to move it. 

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49 minutes ago, hornian said:

I just bought an office building </humblebrag> that was originally built in 1907, and it was moved form Taylor, Texas to Jollyville Road in Austin back in 1986. I’ve been trying to find info about the move, one of the long time tenants says it was in the newspaper. No luck so far. 
 

We have been renovating and had some good  and bad surprises. One of the good surprises was that the 100+ year old hardwood floors that were covered up by plywood and carpet by the previous owners were in good condition and we were able the refinish them. That also allowed us to see exactly where they had but the building in half to move it. 

Did it rent single office setups before?  I think I might know which building you mean.

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1 minute ago, hornian said:

Yep. We are using the bottom floor for my law firm and still renting out the 2nd floor as executive suites. 

Congrats.   I looked at that place years ago for renting a single office.  I didn't end up moving in (previous owners/management didn't seem to understand how internet service works and that it is kind of important for practicing law in the modern age), but you could tell something interesting might be hiding underneath the outdated top layer.

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3 minutes ago, Samson's Wig said:

Congrats.   I looked at that place years ago for renting a single office.  I didn't end up moving in (previous owners/management didn't seem to understand how internet service works and that it is kind of important for practicing law in the modern age), but you could tell something interesting might be hiding underneath the outdated top layer.

Yeah. One of the bad surprises is we are pretty much going to need to rewire the building for better internet speeds and access points, so that comment makes sense. 
 

We also found out the people who moved it rebuilt the porch columns in an idiotic way and had to install a pretty big and expensive beam, as well as all new columns. 
 

But the renovations have been pretty smooth otherwise, and the building looks a lot better inside and out now. 

Edited by hornian
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