Commercial Roof Work
Industrial Roofing with scope notes, photos, and next steps.
Port Everglades doesn't sleep, and neither do the roofs that sit above its terminal buildings, petroleum tank farms, and logistics warehouses. We've been on those roofs in the middle of hurricane season, patching systems that have taken a beating from decades of salt air, UV, and standing water after heavy South Florida downpours. Fort Lauderdale's industrial sector runs from the port straight up I-95 and out along I-595, and every facility in that corridor faces the same brutal combination: 62 inches of rain per year, hurricane-force winds that can arrive with a week's warning or less, zero freeze cycles but relentless thermal expansion, and a salt-laden atmosphere that eats through substandard coatings like nothing you'd see in a landlocked state.
The marine industry here adds a layer of complexity you won't find in most markets. Fort Lauderdale earns the "Venice of America" name honestly — there are boat manufacturers, marine service yards, and yacht outfitters operating out of industrial facilities along the New River, in Dania Beach, and clustered around the Dania Beach industrial and aviation corridor near Hollywood-Fort Lauderdale International. Those buildings are often low-slope metal or modified bitumen roofs with decades of deferred maintenance, and the salt spray coming off the Intracoastal doesn't care about your warranty language. We prioritize stainless or galvanized fasteners, reinforced field seams, and silicone topcoats engineered for coastal UV degradation on every industrial job in this ZIP code.
For the warehouses and distribution buildings stacked along the I-95/I-595 interchange — the Broward County logistics market that feeds both the port and the airport — we typically spec thermoplastic single-ply systems, specifically TPO or 60-mil PVC mechanically fastened to a steel deck. These membranes reflect heat effectively, which matters when you're paying for cooling in a building that runs 24 hours around peak freight cycles. Reflectivity isn't a nice-to-have in Fort Lauderdale; it's a direct line item in your energy budget. A white TPO roof on a 200,000-square-foot distribution center can cut peak cooling demand by a measurable percentage compared to an aged dark-surface BUR system.
Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport industrial area presents its own constraints. Facilities in the aviation corridor deal with vibration from aircraft, FAA height limitations that sometimes affect staging and crane work, and strict access protocols. We work within those environments regularly — job site coordination with airport authority staff, pre-approved crane positions, early-morning or overnight scheduling when active taxiways are involved. That's not a learning curve we want to put on a client during a live project. It's something we sort out before the first roll of membrane goes on a truck.
Hurricane preparedness is not a checkbox on a roofing spec sheet in this market — it's the foundation of every design decision. Florida Building Code wind uplift requirements for Broward County are among the most demanding in the continental US. When we submit an industrial roofing system for permit, we're documenting FM or UL uplift ratings, fastener pull-out testing on the actual deck substrate, and perimeter and corner reinforcement details. The corners and edges of a roof are where failures begin in a hurricane, and we've seen firsthand what happens at Port Everglades and the Dania Beach industrial park when a system that passed paper compliance fails in real wind. We install for 160-mph wind zones on every project unless the structural engineer specifies otherwise.