The kind of wood used here does not burn like normal timber. Its treatment gives it strength and fire resistance. There are some large scale tests that need to be done yet, in order to better understand how a fire would behave in a midsized wood building. It's all in the article.

Keep in mind, this is way more testing than usual, lots of other materials have been used in large buildings, sometimes with disastrous consequences (see: Grenfell Tower fire).

I think of Chicago first. The wood city that burned and led to the invention of 'skyscrapers'.

The focus of this article is innovation in this space.

What happened in Ottawa or Chicago or Tokyo is relevant in a historical sense but this is about recent innovations that make wood viable (both from a safety/fire-resistant perspective and economical).

I think we all know this, but this article was less-than-convincing and nothing has been deployed at scale yet.

Chicago has a CLT building - the new flagship McDonald's restaurant is CLT and steel.

Additionally, a CLT office building has been approved in Chicago and will be the largest CLT building in the United States when finished.