Willamette Week Article

Today the WW published an article about The North Warehouse that has many inaccuracies. One item they reported accurately was that our concertgoers are our primary concern and safety is at the center of what we do. 

Emergency Safety

The North Warehouse and East Annex property has a total of 10 exits. Two 16’ wide garage doors and two push bar enabled doors exit patrons safely on to N Tillamook street at the South of the building. Located West of the main hall, double doors exit patrons safely to a gravel lot where two 25’ gates are located on the South and NW ends of the property. On the North end of the property, push bar enabled exits are located in each space. Each exit is enabled with proper exit signage and staffed by a member of our team for assistance in case of an emergency. Our venue is on street level without flights of stairs and elevators which also makes it very ADA accessible. 

Capacity

The article mentioned that TNW is unsafe in terms of occupancy but did not explain how our capacity is calculated. Those who have been to The North Warehouse know how they feel in our space, but for those who haven’t, we believe the math speaks for itself. Our occupancy is calculated at 15 square feet per person while similar venues in the city, including ones cited in the article, are calculated at 5 square feet per person. If we operated using this same math this would give our Main Hall at 10,000 square feet, not including the Annex or outside lot, a capacity of 1,998 patrons.  We have never had anywhere near that capacity during an event.  We feel that’s too many people to operate safely. 

Portland Fire & Rescue - Special Event Permit

We operate under the Special Event Permit which allows concerts and other public events to be held in non-assembly buildings. The program allows non-assembly buildings a maximum of 12 ‘for profit’ and 12 ‘non-profit’ permits to be used for each address. The permits are for a maximum of four consecutive days. Sprinklers are not a requirement by the Fire Department while operating under a Special Event Permit.

Our lack of sprinklers

 It is true that other venues have sprinklers and we do not. Sprinklers have always been a part of the process that we are actively working towards; to obtain a full-assembly occupancy with proper zoning, sprinkler heads will absolutely hang from our beautiful wooden beams. In the meantime, we have intentionally kept our capacity below other venues.  We have wide open rooms, multiple large garage doors through which to exit, and only one floor.  We also have very high ceilings, which will help keep smoke and heat away from our patrons, if a fire were to occur.  We all agree, The North Warehouse is as safe, or safer, than the other venues. 

Once the City processes our zoning/conditional use application, we will then install sprinklers, to make The North Warehouse even safer. 

Permits & The Structure

The North Warehouse was built in 1924 and over the last century, building codes have changed. We have had certified electricians improve all work that the city deemed necessary to upgrade and are committed to comply with any additional upgrades or changes needed.

Compliance with Portland Fire

We have had 113 successful events in which Portland Fire has inspected the vast majority of. At no time during inspections did Portland Fire deem the event “unsafe”, and nothing was communicated to any management at TNW that we needed to close down the event; which we would have complied with.

Bottom line is if we didn’t know it was safe, we wouldn’t invite you to our party.

-TNW Management