Log entry 06 — Selective demolition & removal
Selective demolition and removal: the cut is half the job
Cutting separates concrete. Demolition and removal take it away — in pieces small enough to handle, through a building that may be occupied, to a lawful destination. Scoping removal separately and explicitly is what prevents the classic surprise: a neat pile of 800-pound slab sections and nobody contracted to move them.
What “selective” means
Selective (interior/strip-out) demolition removes defined elements — a slab panel, a wall section, a stair, a equipment pad — while protecting everything that stays: structure, finishes, MEP systems, and the occupants on the other side of the plastic. It is surgical work done with saws, small breakers, carts, and dust control, not an excavator through a wall. The cut lines from the sawing pages are the demolition plan's boundaries.
The weight problem, in numbers
| Piece | Approx. weight | Handling implication |
|---|---|---|
| Slab section 2 ft x 2 ft x 4 in. | ~200 lb | Two-person carry or cart; the largest sensible hand piece |
| Slab section 4 ft x 4 ft x 6 in. | ~1,200 lb | Machine, gantry, or cut it smaller — nobody hand-carries this |
| Wall panel 3 ft x 7 ft x 8 in. | ~2,100 lb | Lowered by equipment in sections; never dropped and broken in place indoors |
| Core, 12 in. dia. x 8 in. | ~60 lb | One person, with a grip plan — cores are round and roll |
Concrete weighs about 150 lb per cubic foot. Every removal quote is secretly a weight-and-path quote: piece size, carry distance, stairs or elevator, door widths, and where the truck can stand.
Disposal, Massachusetts edition
- Clean concrete (unpainted, uncoated) is recyclable — crushed for aggregate at local facilities; clean loads cost less to place than mixed debris.
- Mixed construction debris goes to a licensed C&D facility with transfer-station fees by weight; Massachusetts bans disposal of clean concrete and similar materials in solid-waste landfills where recycling applies — expect the quote to separate haul from disposal fees.
- Slurry is not debris and not drain water. Wet-cut slurry is vacuumed, contained, and disposed of as a liquid/solid waste per its character — never washed to a storm drain or sanitary line without permission. See the silica and slurry log.
- Older buildings: coatings, adhesives, and adjacent materials can trigger asbestos or lead rules (mill-era buildings especially). Suspect material stops demolition until it is surveyed — a legal requirement, not a preference.
Scope it in writing
A removal scope should state: what is removed, piece-size/handling method, path of egress, floor and finish protection, dust containment level, haul and disposal inclusion, patch-back or leave-ready condition, and who backfills a trench. If a cutting quote says only “cut and remove,” ask which of those lines it covers. The request form asks removal as its own question for exactly this reason.