So, the complaint is that they don't want to stick a fire door on the back of new buildings, since it would undermine some architectural design purity or something?
The first image on this page exemplifies the issue:
https://secondegress.ca/A-Wicked-Problem
https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/9b6f13e0414b47f094ad...
Unlike some building codes, this one is directly connected to a life and death issue and we have seen what happens in fires where people can’t get out.
Perhaps it can be compensated for with various "either two egresses OR each bedroom must be equipped to be fire proof for X minutes" or something, and bring back hook and ladder trucks (arguably which are not used as much because buildings now have multiple egresses when that tall).
This is the kind of absurdly complex regulation that sounds simple, but is a lobbyist's dream. Two exits are easy to know when you've implemented, and easy for regulators to check if you've implemented. A "bedroom" being "fire proof" for X minutes will involve 900 pages of nonsense regulations from which lobbyists have carefully removed anything that will affect their bottom line.
"Each bedroom must be equipped to be fire proof for X minutes" was the type of rule that caused the fire brigades to tell people in Grenfell to stay in their apartments, and even more importantly the type of rule that allowed contractors to claim compliance to was sufficient enough that they could use flammable, shit cladding that was illegal in Europe and the US, and install it incompetently (because if the units were "fireproof," who could care?)
When you have a 99% chance of things going well, and a 1% chance of things going badly, normally you would feel very safe. But when “things going badly” can mean dozens or hundreds of people dying in a fire, that 1% suddenly looks a lot more serious.
Besides Grenfell, the same thing (without deaths, thankfully) happened in Milan (very similar issue with aluminium panels on the outside):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iNvbxTMSM5Y
What emerged from both these fires is that some of the "new" materials are far less safe than expected and that the fire brigades simply have no means to pump water at a height more than a few floors (ten-twelve?).
"Zeidler explains that “this appears to be a reasonable precaution for life safety. However, the life safety of this single stair type in Europe has been equal to, if not better than ours,” due to the fact that the single stair scheme is shared between fewer units."
And that's the thing, entire countries disagree on the necessity of a second stairwell for fire safety, and there's data to back up the position.
But because a lot of people in North America have those (unfounded) fears, the second stairwell is part of the building code, and as a result an entire class of buildings don't get built because the economics don't work out.
And in low rise buildings, there's usually a LOT of stairways lol. A typic suburban US apartment complex has a half dozen buildings, and each one has maybe 12 apartments and like 4 stairways.
https://www.treehugger.com/single-stair-buildings-united-sta...
I don't believe the fears are unfounded, and frankly I don't see why anyone should buy what this Zeidler guy is selling -- if what he is saying is true, all it means is that European buildings should also be changed to have multiple egress options for every unit!
Seriously, would you be willing to live on the 6th floor of a building where the only way out in a fire is a single staircase? Don't look at statistics to decide this: even if you would be safe most of the time, it only takes one outlier incident to kill you, so why put yourself in that situation?
I think the argument is: adding a second staircase means creating a large hallway, which might make it easier for the fire to spread.
I don't see why we shouldn't look at statistics. If something is statistically safer, wouldn't we want that?
Of course, in SF it's practically illegal to build anything under any circumstances if any of your neighbors decide they don't like it.
In a small multi-apartment block, up to 10-12 apartments (5/6 on 2 floors or 2/3 on 4-5 floors) the single stairs/fire exit will be used by the same amount of people or less.
If you prefer, if you graph it, the function of number of stairs per block depends on number of apartments and the points are:
1=1
2=2
3=2
4=2
5=2 ...
what the author is saying is that the step at 2 apartments is too low, compared to what are the norms in other countries and that these countries have not worse records, statistically, for deaths in fires.
This latter is debatable, as there are so many factors involved such as efficiency of rescue/fire services, type of construction (materials used), height of rooms, sizes of windows, number of floors of the "average" building in any given country (and even local situations, city by city) that it is difficult to do a sensible comparison.
I couldn't find out out _why_ a second fire exit makes it hard though. Maybe it's not the door, but the need for an extra stairwell?
I'd hesitate to call it pretentious wank just because I don't understand it, so let's just say that the site was clearly not written for a lay audience.
"The building typology of five to six-storey apartment buildings usually involves a single shared central stair, accessed directly from the street with typically two to four dwelling units per floor. However, because the Ontario Building Code requires two means of egress, mid-rise buildings in Toronto are designed with two exit stairs connected by a common corridor. The result is that mid-rise construction only proves feasible on larger sites where around ten or more units can fit within a typical floor plan to achieve an efficient floor area ratio. Zeidler explains that “this appears to be a reasonable precaution for life safety. However, the life safety of this single stair type in Europe has been equal to, if not better than ours,” due to the fact that the single stair scheme is shared between fewer units. By changing the code requirement for two exit stairs, apartment buildings of midrise height could be designed around a single common stair. For instance, a point-access block, the dominant housing typology in dense urban contexts like Berlin, Paris, or Barcelona, is currently not permitted in Canada."
That central hallway seems small, but it eats a fairly substantial percentage of the footprint space of the building. (elevators and trashrooms are also examples of things that eat a lot of footprint; limiting them for smaller buildings is beneficial for floorplan efficiency)
And since people do not like bedrooms without windows, having apartments that don't span the width of a building limits possible floorplans, and drives the apartment design towards studios and 1 bedrooms.
The buildings tend to become very wide in order to accommodate enough apartments to make them worthwhile to build, so they tend to use up a high percentage of the lot they are sited on, which reduces greenspace and other resident amennities.
[1] BCC Ruling No. 14-03-1366: https://web.archive.org/web/20210422142050/http://www.mah.go...
In Italy a room, any room for residential use, not only needs a window, but the window(s) surface must be at least 1/8 or in some cases 1/12 of the floor surface of that room, a windowless room can only be a bathroom (with a compulsory exhaust fan) or a closet/corridor/storage/utility room.
But this comes not from fire related laws, but rather from minimal health requirements (natural light, ventilation).
As someone that will easily lie in bed to whatever hour, it's very easy to sit around in complete blackness and come outside to realise it's 4pm.