Safety within floor area: business and personal services or mercantile occupancy

[sunyaer]

Ontario building Code section 3.3 deals with safety within floor areas. When the conditions in 3.3.1.1. are not satisficed, such as in a building with business and personal services or mercantile as major occupancy that is not sprinklered, how to determine the fire resistance rating of the separation of suites?
The reason I am asking this question is that unlike other major occupancies, there is no subsection in section 3.3 which dedicatedly deals with safety in business and personal services or mercantile occupancy.

 

[tmurray]

They are exempt from the fire resistance rating. However, the separation must still be constructed as a fire separation. Most people call this a "smoke seal" the intent is just to prevent the circulation of smoke between suites, but not provide an hourly rating against fire.

 

[Inspector Gadget]

To put this in context: I had news today of a person who owns a part 9 building - two storeys. D occupancy on the ground floor, C suite (one) above. They want to create a second D occupancy on the second floor. We will require a 45-minute fire sep and STC 50 between the new D and the C, but 9.10.9.13(1) exempts D occupancies from a rated fire separation: so a fire separation is required (ie: drywalled demising wall) but no rating is required. Were the building sprinklered, the fire separation would not be required. [9.10.9.13(2)].