Guess I was looking at the elevator provision
1007.2.1 Elevators required. In buildings where a required accessible floor is four or more stories above or below a level of exit discharge, at least one required accessible means of egress shall be an elevator complying with Section 1007.4.
Exceptions:
1. In buildings equipped throughout with an automatic sprinkler system installed in accordance with Section 903.3.1.1 or 903.3.1.2, the elevator shall not be required on floors provided with a horizontal exit and located at or above the levels of exit discharge.
2. In buildings equipped throughout with an automatic sprinkler system installed in accordance with Section 903.3.1.1 or 903.3.1.2, the elevator shall not be required on floors provided with a ramp conforming to the provisions of Section 1010.
Elevators are the most common and convenient means of providing access to the upper floors in multistory buildings. As such, elevators represent a prime candidate for accessible means of egress from such buildings, especially in light of the difficulties involved in carrying a person up or down a stairway for multiple levels. The primary consideration for elevators as an accessible means of egress is that the elevator will be available and protected during a fire event to allow for fire department assisted rescue. Typically it is not the intent that people use the elevator for self-evacuation due to the hazards associated with smoke in the elevator shaft or the elevator taking people to the floor with a direct fire hazard. There are some new technological advances for "fire service access elevators" and "occupant evacuation elevators" that are discussed in Sections 403, 3007 and 3008.
This section addresses where an elevator must serve as part of an accessible means of egress. See Section 1104 for when elevators are required for the accessible route into a building. By a reference to Section 1007.4, both an area of refuge and a standby source of power for the elevator is required. The standby power requirement establishes a higher degree of reliability that the elevator will be available and usable by reducing the likelihood of power loss caused by fire or other conditions of power failure.
In buildings having four or more stories above or below the level of exit discharge, it is unreasonable to rely solely on exit stairways for all of the required accessible means of egress. This is the point at which complete reliance on assisted evacuation down the stairs will not be effective or adequate because of the limited availability of either experienced personnel who are trained to carry people safely (i.e., fire fighters) or the availability of special devices (i.e., self-braking stairway descent equipment or evacuation chairs). In this case, the code requires that at least one elevator, serving all floors of the building, is to serve as one of the required accessible means of egress. This should not represent a hardship, since elevators are typically provided in such buildings for the convenience of the occupants.
On a flat site, "buildings with four or more stories above the level of exit discharge" would typically be a five-story building. The level of exit discharge is the first floor level, and the fifth floor is the fourth story above that. A story four stories below the level of exit discharge would be the fourth basement level. The verbiage is such that a building built on a sloped site can take into consideration that people may be exiting the building from different levels on different sides of the building (see Figure 1007.2.1).
Exception 1 establishes that accessible egress elevator service to floor levels at or above the level of exit discharge is not necessary under specified conditions. The conditions are that the building is equipped throughout with an automatic sprinkler system in accordance with NFPA 13 or NFPA 13R (see Section 903.3.1.1 or 903.3.1.2) and the floors not serviced by an accessible egress elevator are provided with a horizontal exit. The presence of an automatic sprinkler system significantly reduces the potential fire hazard and provides for increased evacuation time. The combination of automatic sprinklers and a horizontal exit provides adequate protection for the occupants despite their distance to the level of exit discharge. This exception does not apply to floor levels below the level of exit discharge, since such levels are typically below grade and do not have the added advantage of exterior openings that are available for fire-fighting or rescue purposes. This option is most often utilized when a defend-in-place approach to occupant protection is utilized, such as in a hospital, nursing home or jail. Keep in mind that the horizontal exit (see Section 1025) creates large refuge areas that have separation requirements and capacity requirements that exceed area of refuge requirements.
Exception 2 specifies that a building sprinklered throughout in accordance with NFPA 13 or NFPA 13R (see Section 903.3.1.1 or 903.3.1.2), with ramp access to each level, such as in a sports stadium, is not required to also have an elevator for accessible means of egress. The reasoning behind this is that the issue of carrying people down stairways does not occur because the ramps may be utilized instead.
