North Charleston Fire Museum
North Charleston, SC
Britt, Peters and Associates provided structural design services for the City of North Charleston’s newest museum, which houses the corporate collection of antique fire trucks donated by Charleston-based American LaFrance, the nation’s premier maker of emergency vehicles. A satellite office of the Charleston Convention and Visitors Bureau shares the facility. The one-story building is sited on five acres.
The facility’s design called for construction using structural steel with cold-formed metal framing infill. Because of the large, open-volume area needed for showcasing the exhibits, careful planning was required for the spacing and configuration of the steel frames and trusses in the museum. The steel trusses — which support the gable roof — are designed with a clear-span of 100 feet.
A destination for tourists and schoolchildren, special features include an attractive “queuing up” space designed to accommodate groups arriving on buses.
Firefighters from across the Lowcountry of South Carolina provided input on the museum’s design. Six words carved in the cast-stone columns — Courage, Valor, Protect, Service, Honor, Loyalty — serve as a visible reminder of their participation in the project.
North Charleston - It could be considered the Lowcountry’s nicest garage. Tucked inside the new fire museum in North Charleston are all kinds of firefighting exhibits, including two that actually belch big puffs of smoke. But at its core, this building was designed to provide shelter and display space for 18 fire trucks built between 1857 and 1969.
