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Comment by dylan604 | Hacker News Reader

> and I still dream about arcologies

even after 9/11 and London's Greenfeel Tower fire? The vertical living seems very strained to me after events like that. Sure, they are not common issues, but there's always that thought in the back of my mind of what if.

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Apartments are safer than single family houses regarding fires.

In 2023, the annual fire fatality rates for single-family homes and older multifamily homes were roughly equivalent at 7.6 and 7.7 deaths per million, respectively. In contrast, according to Pew researchers, the annual fire fatality rate for newer multifamily residences was 1.2 deaths per million.

https://www.multifamilyexecutive.com/apartment-trends/modern...

A single family home built to today's standards will be safer than an apartment built 50 years ago. Of course newer built anything complying with modernized fire safety regulations will be safer than older anything. I feel like your point is missing the mark

A major contributor to this statistic is fire sprinklers. New apartment complex construction for decades has required them but they're virtually nonexistent in single-family homes, and that's unlikely to change anytime soon.

California has mandated it for new construction for over a decade now. Of course old stock doesn't really ever turn over in California so it's entirely possible that we will never reach a point where a majority of SFH in California have sprinklers, but it's certainly possible to change for new homes.

that's actually not true at all. today's homes flash up in a matter of minutes, where as older homes can take nearly a half hour. today's homes are designed to minimize the chance of danger, but in situations like a fire, once they happen they are more dangerous today than they were in the past.

Does that change with the growing market share of 5 over 1 wooden mixed used buildings?

The Grenfell fire was caused by petty corruption. Someone involved in its construction used a cheaper flammable cladding material instead of the (slightly!!) more expensive fire resistant version.

It’s very on-brand for places like Russia and China but clearly western countries are not immune to this kind of thing either.

After the fire there were investigations into towers constructed here in Australia. Many used the cheaper flammable cladding material also. Just like with Grenfell, nothing much was done and nobody went to prison.

What does that have to do with the actual idea that being in a tall building could make it difficult to escape. It doesn't matter if the cause of the disaster is cheap building materials or an external force acting on a properly built building.

The material should've behaved like concrete; stopping fire / smoke instead of spreading it.

That way firefighters can take people down the elevators safely etc.

Grenfell was iirc social housing.

A contractor is less likely to fuck around with people who can afford very good lawyers.

I feel like at the scale of an arcology, there isn't really much of a meaningful difference between there being a fire blocking your escape in the massive structure vs, say, fire blocking you escape in a mall. You're either completely surrounded by fire or you're not.

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