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Building Official insists waiting area is "A" occupancy

Ask the BO if he has ever seen a waiting room in a medical office on the second floor of a V_B building? Of course he has, they are everywhere..............and an A is not allowed on the second floor.....................hmnnnnnnnnnnn. Not an A, it is a B.
 
I agree the Occupant load should be calculated at 1/15 unless you have a furniture layout that would show otherwise. But in any case you should not be using Assembly anything for the plumbing calcs. it is all B.
The IBC commentary says you must follow use not occupancy. Also, says you must use the egress occupant load calculations.
 
The IBC commentary says you must follow use not occupancy. Also, says you must use the egress occupant load calculations.
The only "waiting" identified in a A-3 occupancy is waiting at a transportation terminal.

So by your logic there could not be any office waiting rooms on floors of buildings that would not allow it due to the construction type. A on floor 2 of a V-B How is that gonna work? It is a B and the plumbing cals should be for a B, not some mixed use calculation with an A.
 
The only "waiting" identified in a A-3 occupancy is waiting at a transportation terminal.

So by your logic there could not be any office waiting rooms on floors of buildings that would not allow it due to the construction type. A on floor 2 of a V-B How is that gonna work? It is a B and the plumbing cals should be for a B, not some mixed use calculation with an A.
Not denying the part about Type VB. I understand you have no other choice but to calculate plumbing fixtures using the actual use, example: a Conference room un a bank is an assembly use for both egress and plumbing calculations. Sorry if I misunderstood you before.
 
A conference room in a office or bank especially if under 50 occupants would never have a minimum plumbing fixture calc based upon Assembly occupancy. Use the egress load sure, but a B or an M.
 
I hear you. I have a project in that exact situation (conf room with 25 occupants max) in Nebraska and I hope I could find any part of the code that supports your claim. So far I think I have no choice but to go with assembly for calculating the plumbing fixtures for that space.
 
2018 IBC 303.1.2 small assembly space. that section will clarify it. It is a B.

When we do golf clubhouses, conference centers or event centers we will do a mixed use plumbing fixture calc because it is very advantageous. But these are buildings with Assembly, Food Service and Office uses. Never for something like is being discussed here.
 
A conference room in a office or bank especially if under 50 occupants would never have a minimum plumbing fixture calc based upon Assembly occupancy. Use the egress load sure, but a B or an M.
the text below is from the IPC commentary which make it clear to me that plumbing fixture calculations are not 100% ties to occupancy, but how the spaces will actually be used.
Consider a barber college where the IBC classifies the entire building as a Group B occupancy. The building has several large assembly rooms where the intent is
to have training sessions for large groups of students. Clearly, these areas are used for assembly and therefore, the use of the fixture ratios in Section 1, Description Row 5 of Table 403.1 should be used. The choice of an occupancy use for the purposes of determining plumbing fixtures does not affect the
occupancy group chosen for IBC purposes, that being for egress. In other words, using a previous example, the school gymnasium with stage space should be
chosen to be “assembly use” for plumbing fixture requirements, but the entire building is still a Group E occupancy for the purposes of egress as far as the
IBC is concerned
 
If the "assembly" is accessory to the main use then use the building occupancy classification. If you have mixed uses within a building that exceed the 10% accessory limit then you base the plumbing fixtures on the use of the space, Similar to what the commentary example uses.
 
If the "assembly" is accessory to the main use then use the building occupancy classification. If you have mixed uses within a building that exceed the 10% accessory limit then you base the plumbing fixtures on the use of the space, Similar to what the commentary example uses.
Ok, but who makes this discretionary judgement? The PC? Does the IBC prescribe this?
 
I am not sure you need to do anything to your plumbing counts assuming you current show (1) make & (1) female toilet room. Looking back thru your posts you have a 3300 SF clinic with a 479 SF waiting area. Based on that info I am coming up with 32 occupants in the waiting area (479 / 15) & 29 occupants in the remainder of the building (2821 / 100) . I then apply the B occupancy plumbing calculations to the 29 occupants and one of the A3 Occupancy plumbing calculations to the 32 waiting room occupants. Even though the waiting room is technical a B occupancy and not an A3 occupancy, the IPC code commentary is very clear that plumbing fixtures can be calculated this way.

If we are all in agreement with this, I then come up with the following calculations

Water Closets
A3 Male water closets 1 per 125 = 0.13 fixtures
B Male water closets = 0.60 fixtures
Total male water closets = 0.73, rounded up to 1.0

A3 Female water closets 1 per 65 = 0.25 fixtures
B Female water closets = 0.60 fixtures
Total Female water closets = 0.85, rounded up to 1.0


Lavatories

A3 Male lavatories 1 per 200 = 0.08 fixtures
B Male lavatories = 0.38 fixtures
Total male lavatories = 0.46, rounded up to 1.0

A3 Female lavatories 1 per 200 = 0.08 fixtures
B Female lavatories = 0.38 fixtures
Total Female lavatories = 0.46, rounded up to 1.0


Drinking Fountains

A3 Drinking Fountains 1 per 500 = 0.06
B Drinking Fountains 1 per 100 = .29
Total Drinking Fountains = 0.35, rounded up to 1……(Must provide a high & low fixture, minimum of 2 DF required)


So based on my math you need to provide one male and one female toilet room, and 2 drinking fountains to meet the HiLo Requirement


I'm late to the party here! I've been in this situation many times. What Tim explained is exactly the answer the OP needed. He's not really worried about what occupancy is assigned where, he's worried about the number of toilets he has to put in. If you use fractional numbers like Tim did before rounding up to a whole fixture you wind up with so many fewer fixtures. Especially if you have several uses like F,B,S,A and round up the fixture requirement for each use before summing.
 
I'm late to the party here! I've been in this situation many times. What Tim explained is exactly the answer the OP needed. He's not really worried about what occupancy is assigned where, he's worried about the number of toilets he has to put in. If you use fractional numbers like Tim did before rounding up to a whole fixture you wind up with so many fewer fixtures. Especially if you have several uses like F,B,S,A and round up the fixture requirement for each use before summing.
In the instance he the OP is discussing you would only use a B occupancy for the plumbing calculations. an A would never come into play. The OP's 479 SF waiting room is a B for every purpose. The BO needs to familiarize themselves with 2018 IBC 303.1.2 small assembly space.
 
I'm late to the party here! I've been in this situation many times. What Tim explained is exactly the answer the OP needed. He's not really worried about what occupancy is assigned where, he's worried about the number of toilets he has to put in. If you use fractional numbers like Tim did before rounding up to a whole fixture you wind up with so many fewer fixtures. Especially if you have several uses like F,B,S,A and round up the fixture requirement for each use before summing.
The IPC commentary version shows exampls using fractional numbers for each occupancies fixture counts and then only rounding up after all the fractional numbers are totaled.
 
I would suspect that the office staff wants thier own bathroom and they want the waiting room to have thier's. This is a typical scenario that I have seen when dealing with tenant space doctor offices and stand alone doctor offices.

I'll agree with the Tim's on both counts.

We're also seeing an up-tic on making bathrooms universal on some tenant spaces, so often the building owners are trying to split spaces and it disrupts the M & W bathroom requirements on a lot of old existing spaces.
 
I would suspect that the office staff wants thier own bathroom and they want the waiting room to have thier's. This is a typical scenario that I have seen when dealing with tenant space doctor offices and stand alone doctor offices.

I'll agree with the Tim's on both counts.

We're also seeing an up-tic on making bathrooms universal on some tenant spaces, so often the building owners are trying to split spaces and it disrupts the M & W bathroom requirements on a lot of old existing spaces.
I think I mentioned FGI in a previous post. My office does a lot of healthcare work including doctors offices and when it comes to toilet facilities most of the states we work in (east coast) require that we follow FGI Guidelines instead of the plumbing code. In many cases FGI requires that waiting rooms have access to their own toilet facilities or access to a common toilet core. and once inside the treatment FGI often requires separate toilet facilities for patients and staff. I am not saying this project falls under these FGI guidelines, but its something that should be looked into.
 
Ok, but who makes this discretionary judgement? The PC? Does the IBC prescribe this?
I do as the AHJ providing consistency in the plan review process. If a designer chooses a different method and has more fixtures okay, if less fixtures then we sit down and discuss how and why they have less

With this "gender" crap coming into the codes and not dividing the number equally between the sexes (male and female) it will be just a matter of time before a designer uses the all in one room design to reduce the number of WC and Lavs needed.
 
With this "gender" crap coming into the codes and not dividing the number equally between the sexes (male and female) it will be just a matter of time before a designer uses the all in one room design to reduce the number of WC and Lavs needed.

Yep!
It may come up in future code hearings if not already. $$$

I'm seeing lavatory designs outside the gender bathrooms now to cut cost as well, some of you probably have been seeing this for sometime now.
 
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