Garden Style Apartment Stairs & Shaft Enclosure Requirement

[aarondahl]

Howdy.

We have a garden style apartment (R-2) project, fully sprinkled and 3 stories. The arrangement includes shared breezeways with open exterior stairs front and rear in compliance with Section 1027 (IBC 2021). Walls are 1-hr. with 20 minute, self closing doors. There are no other openings in the breezeway. Our code reviewer is requesting compliance with the shaft enclosure provision found in 1019.3. I am unable to locate an exception for exterior stairways from this section of the code. The only applicable execption in here is Exception 4, but I cannot imagine draft curtains in an exteior stairway serving any benefit.

Apartments like these are built across the country without draft curtains. What am I missing?

Thanks,

 

[Jay Smith]

It sounds like an exterior exit stairway that would be addressed in 1027.6.

 

[mtlogcabin]

Once the occupant leaves the residence they are in the exit.

[BE] EXIT ACCESS STAIRWAY. A stairway within the exit access portion of the means of egress system.

[BE] EXIT ACCESS. That portion of a means of egress system that leads from any occupied portion of a building or structure to an exit.
[BE] EXIT DISCHARGE. That portion of a means of egress system between the termination of an exit and a public way.
[BE] EXIT. That portion of a means of egress system between the exit access and the exit discharge or public way. Exit components include exterior exit doors at the level of exit discharge, interior exit stairways and ramps, exit passageways, exterior exit stairways and ramps and horizontal exits.

 

[aarondahl]

Thank you mtlogcabin.

In this instance none of these sections cited by the reviewer should even apply: 712 Vertical Openings, 1019 Exit Access Stairways and Ramps, 1020 Corridors. The only one applicable is 1027 and we are meeting the requirements of each subsection here.

Seems I may have my work cut out for me with this plan reviewer.

 

[Yikes]

Part of the issue is how you define the word "breezeway".
If I understand correctly, you are describing something like this arrangement, which is an open-ended corridor with stairs at either end. the stairs are open to the exterior, but the "beezeway" is enclosed except for the ends, where it joins up with the stair. Is this generally describing your situation?

• If so, the "breezeway" is called an "open-ended corridor" (1027.6 exception #3.2).
• If your breezeway is at least 50% open on its perimeter per 1027.6 exception #2), then instead of an "open ended corridor" it may be thought of as an "exterior exit balcony".

Several issues here:

• Even if you meet the distance requirements for exit access (table 1017.2), you cannot atmospherically interconnect more than 2 stories in an exit access system (1019.3 exception #1). So at a minimum you need to separate at least one of the stories from the other two at the exit access stairways.
• If these are exit stairs (instead of exit access stairs), then 1027.6 requires that they be separated from the rest of the building interior per 1023.2. There is an specific 1027.6 exception #3 which has 5 conditions, all of which must be met, in order for the stairs to net be separated from the rest of the building. You did not provide enough information in your post for us to determine compliance.

My guess is that when the plan checker was saying that the stairs must be building like a shaft enclosure, it was a simplified way of referring to these particular stairway protection issues.