NFPA Journal - July/August 2018 - 48

Perspectives

A S S E M B LY O C C U P A N C I E S

FIELDING ALL
CHALLENGES

ATLANTA'S NEW SUNTRUST PARK IS MUCH MORE
THAN A BASEBALL STADIUM. FROM BARS TO
OFFICE SPACE TO METALLICA, HOW THE LOCAL
FIRE DEPARTMENT MANAGES A BUSTLING AND
COMPLEX ENTERTAINMENT FACILITY.
Interview conducted and edited by Angelo Verzoni
ike most Major League Baseball
stadiums, the Atlanta Braves' SunTrust Park is much more than a place
where America's pastime is played.
The stadium is in Cobb County,
Georgia, about 10 miles northwest of downtown
Atlanta, and hosts an array of special events. From
concerts by Billy Joel and Metallica to a day celebrating the release of the latest Star Wars movie,
the diverse events held at the facility attract
equally diverse crowds, whose size and unique
behaviors inside a space that was designed exclusively for baseball challenge the prescriptive
nature of codes and standards, according to Nick
Dawe, a deputy fire marshal and captain with
Cobb County Fire & Emergency Services.
But by forging a close working relationship
with the Braves organization when the stadium

Piano Man
An estimated
37,000 fans
attended a Billy Joel
show in April 2017,
the first of many
concerts held at
SunTrust Park.

48 | NFPA JOURNAL * J U L Y /A U G U S T 2 0 1 8

was still being designed, the fire
department has been able to
make each event at the four-story,
1.1-million-square-foot facility safe.
It's an ongoing process of collaboration and innovation between the
Braves and the Cobb County fire
department, Dawe told me, since
virtually no two events are exactly
the same. When we spoke in May,
he was already at work planning
what he considered to be the stadium's most challenging event to
date-back-to-back concerts featuring country rockers Zac Brown
Band, followed by Def Leppard and
Journey, slated for the last weekend in June.
SunTrust Park is one of over
a dozen assembly occupancies
located within The Battery, a
property that's still expanding and
resembles a town within a town,
housing other concert venues,
restaurants, bars, a brewery,
shops, and office and residential space. But given its size and
the frequency with which it hosts
non-baseball events-about every
weekend, by Dawe's count-the
stadium has been and continues
to be the most challenging facility within The Battery to protect
from fire and other life safety
hazards. Dawe, who serves on
several NFPA technical committees, explained some of the
reasons why that's the case.
How much work did your
department have to do as SunTrust Park was being built?
There was activity and construction at the property 24/7. To build
something that big, we have a
record of 1,812 inspections we did over that
short two-and-a-half-year period, from the time
of the groundbreaking of the stadium to when
it opened. And that's a lot for a department of
our size. We would schedule time to review the
plans for the stadium with the design team on a
weekly basis, all while keeping up with our other
inspections and our other plan reviews in the
rest of the county, which weren't delayed.

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of NFPA Journal - July/August 2018