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Wow, being European and used to single-stairwell multi-story buildings, the North American obsession with fire escapes has always seen weird, and it's super int

Wow, being European and used to single-stairwell multi-story buildings, the North American obsession with fire escapes has always seen weird, and it's super interesting that its codification causes the economy of mid-rises to not work out, which in turn causes the weird housing distribution of North American cities. The "missing middle", that the site is talking about.

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synu 4y ago
I think it comes from the houses being made out of wood instead of brick. Or at least it seems likely comparing houses in the Netherlands and US. The way houses burn is just totally different.
- henrikschroder 4y ago
  Yeah, that might be a big part of it. I was shocked to discover how flimsy multi-story houses are constructed in North America compared to what I'm used to. Every single apartment I've lived in in Stockholm has had a single stairwell, and it's not something I've ever thought about because no-one thinks of it as an issue. But on the other hand, those stairwells are always concrete and stone and marble, and fire regulations forbid you from storing anything in the stairwells or outside your apartment. Take my current Stockholm apartment, there's a four-storey drop from the balcony to the ground and a single stairwell, which would apparently horrify every North American. But the walls are concrete. The walls between apartments are concrete or drywall. There's four apartments per landing. The apartment doors are made of steel. And the stairwell is empty and marbled, so there's nothing that can burn in the stairwell, and it's very difficult for fire to spread from one apartment to the others. There's no sprinkler system, but I think there's a fire extinguisher on each landing. Not a problem.
  - oivey 4y ago
    If an apartment is on fire between yours and the stairwell and that fire extends to the hallway, then you’re dead, right? If there was a second stairwell on the opposite side then you’d still be able to escape. I’m pretty sure sprinklers have been shown to massively increase fire safety.
    - henrikschroder 4y ago
      > and that fire extends to the hallway, then you’re dead, right? The point is that this can't happen for a number of reasons. The landings in my building are quite small, four doors and a stairwell, it's literally two meters from my apartment door to the stairwell, there are no long corridors. And there's nothing that can burn in the stairwell, it's all concrete and stone and steel. And all the apartment doors are steel as well. The dangers of apartment fires are mitigated differently, so that there is no need for a second stairwell or fire escape. And this is something I didn't see on the site, and which is probably where they're a bit wrong and misguided. Just because actual fire statistics are better in Europe than in North America despite allowing single stairwells, it doesn't mean you can remove the requirement from the Ontario building code and everything will be fine and dandy. You have to add all the other things that mitigate fire hazards.
  - colinb 4y ago
    (I think that) Flimsy ~= less likely to fall down in an earthquake. When I moved from Ireland to California I moved into a two storey (1940s?) apartment apparently constructed from drinking straws and toilet paper. But… a few weeks later the area was struck by a significant quake. Part of the freeway fell down. I was woken from sleep by the building swaying and creaking. But it didn’t fall down. Try your Stockholm apartment in that.
    - henrikschroder 4y ago
      This doesn't make sense. The US can obviously build earthquake-proof concrete and steel skyscrapers, just look at the entire SF downtown. So if you can do that, why wouldn't you be able to build earthquake-proof midrise buildings out of concrete and steel? When I lived in SF I was woken one night by an earthquake, the entire 42-story high-rise I was living in was swaying back and forth, but obviously didn't collapse. Sure, I can see how a wooden construction is a cheaper way to make buildings earthquake-proof, but does it really cost that much to earthquake-proof a mid-rise? Or is it not economically feasible to build mid-rises out of anything but wood in the first place?
- rqtwteye 4y ago
  That’s what I am thinking. It’s hard to imagine a scenario where the brick house I grew up in Germany could burn down but my US house would probably burn completely once the wood in the walls has caught fire.
NickBusey 4y ago
Yes, our obsession with not wanting to burn to death. So weird. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iroquois_Theatre_fire https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iroquois_Theatre_fire Or more recent and relevant, an apartment fire: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2022_Bronx_apartment_fire https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2022_Bronx_apartment_fire
- petesergeant 4y ago
  Do more Western Europeans burn to death than Americans?
  - pessimizer 4y ago
    I feel this is something you can check yourself and bring back to the thread instead of asking rhetorically, as if it's obvious that they don't.
voz_ 4y ago
Europe is behind on a lot of safety infrastructure compared to the US. You frame it as obsession, but really it's just good policy. > which in turn causes the weird housing distribution of North American cities. This is a hilarious misunderstanding of the complex intersection of class divides, race divides, gerrymandering, history (white flight), nimbyism, and for-profit zoning that has led to the current lack of mid-rise affordable housing.
- JumpCrisscross 4y ago
  > it's just good policy Is there any empirical data on the safety benefits of a second stairwell?
  - voz_ 4y ago
    In the spirit of curiosity - how would you go about measuring that? A counterfactual is almost impossible. That being said - when in doubt, I favor more regulation for safety, not less.
    - jeffbee 4y ago
      You could measure it by people who perish in structure fires, a metric on which America is far behind Europe.
      - rwmj 4y ago
        You'd need to weigh that against the costs and lost opportunities. If no one can buy an affordable apartment and overengineering is part of the cause, or if many die because of a car-centric culture because you can't built densely enough, that can be a problem.
        frickinLasers 4y ago
        I'd wager most of the US deaths occur in single-family homes--in basements (illegally housed), or even while sleeping in rooms with plenty of opportunity for egress.
vkou 4y ago
Fire codes aren't the reason that you can't build in most of North America. NIMBYism, and the cultural obsession with low-density, single-family homes only made possible by car-centric transportation infrastructure is. Which is also in no small part caused by a financial and tenant rights system that pushes people towards home ownership, instead of renting.
- astrange 4y ago
  Part of the car-centric infrastructure is fire codes. American towns have lots of fire departments which all refuse to buy smaller European-style fire trucks, and all roads have to be built to fit what they buy. European buildings are also less likely to be made out of wood, which is good if you care about fire safety that much.
  - vkou 4y ago
    > Part of the car-centric infrastructure is fire codes. No, it's not. Cheap gas[0], giant freaking interstates, and public transit systems (when they are even present) that are very clearly built for the 'poors' are. Another 3% to the per-square-foot-cost of building a multi-tenant building aren't the reason that Houston has 12 and 16-lane highways cutting right through the city, or why it takes an hour to travel by bus in Stockton a distance that you could travel in 10 minutes by car. Fitting fire trucks is a problem for local, last-mile streets[1], not arterials, and availability of arterials (and lack of availability of alternatives) are what plays a large part in how people get around. [0] Under $3.20/gallon in most of the country, compared to over $7/gallon in most of Europe. Not to mention the double-whammy of generally lower[2] European wages. [1] Most American suburbs solve the width-of-last-mile-street problem by simply... Not having sidewalks. It's not like there's anywhere you can walk to from them... [2] Okay, okay, yes, Western European take-home incomes for low-paying jobs tend to be higher than their American counterparts.
    - astrange 4y ago
      I mean I didn't say it was all of it, it's just another small part of it. Those are more important factors, yes, but minor issues by land area are more important if they especially affect urban areas. Parking minimums and setbacks are like that too. > and public transit systems (when they are even present) that are very clearly built for the 'poors' This one's funny because it's true, but the way you write it makes it sound disparaging - whereas if you said they were designed for "equity" then everyone would agree that's what it's for and that it's good. Another way to say it is, American transit planners will happily make a project worse and take longer to build, as long as it reaches poorer communities first.
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orthoxerox 4y ago
There's probably a fire escape somewhere that you haven't noticed. When I lived in a 23-storey building it had a second fire escape stairwell and a fire escape ladder outside next to the garbage chutes. I now live in a 9-storey building and it has a fire escape ladder bolted next to the balconies.
- henrikschroder 4y ago
  > There's probably a fire escape somewhere that you haven't noticed. No.
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majormajor 4y ago
3-6 story midrises with multiple staircases are all over the place in the USA, but many of them are on larger lots than seem to be being discussed here for Canada. For smaller-footprint (multiple buildings per city block), stairwells in opposite corners seems to be the most common pattern. About six to ten units per floor in a rectangle.

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synu 4y ago

I think it comes from the houses being made out of wood instead of brick. Or at least it seems likely comparing houses in the Netherlands and US. The way houses burn is just totally different.

henrikschroder 4y ago
Yeah, that might be a big part of it. I was shocked to discover how flimsy multi-story houses are constructed in North America compared to what I'm used to. Every single apartment I've lived in in Stockholm has had a single stairwell, and it's not something I've ever thought about because no-one thinks of it as an issue. But on the other hand, those stairwells are always concrete and stone and marble, and fire regulations forbid you from storing anything in the stairwells or outside your apartment. Take my current Stockholm apartment, there's a four-storey drop from the balcony to the ground and a single stairwell, which would apparently horrify every North American. But the walls are concrete. The walls between apartments are concrete or drywall. There's four apartments per landing. The apartment doors are made of steel. And the stairwell is empty and marbled, so there's nothing that can burn in the stairwell, and it's very difficult for fire to spread from one apartment to the others. There's no sprinkler system, but I think there's a fire extinguisher on each landing. Not a problem.
- oivey 4y ago
  If an apartment is on fire between yours and the stairwell and that fire extends to the hallway, then you’re dead, right? If there was a second stairwell on the opposite side then you’d still be able to escape. I’m pretty sure sprinklers have been shown to massively increase fire safety.
  - henrikschroder 4y ago
    > and that fire extends to the hallway, then you’re dead, right? The point is that this can't happen for a number of reasons. The landings in my building are quite small, four doors and a stairwell, it's literally two meters from my apartment door to the stairwell, there are no long corridors. And there's nothing that can burn in the stairwell, it's all concrete and stone and steel. And all the apartment doors are steel as well. The dangers of apartment fires are mitigated differently, so that there is no need for a second stairwell or fire escape. And this is something I didn't see on the site, and which is probably where they're a bit wrong and misguided. Just because actual fire statistics are better in Europe than in North America despite allowing single stairwells, it doesn't mean you can remove the requirement from the Ontario building code and everything will be fine and dandy. You have to add all the other things that mitigate fire hazards.
- colinb 4y ago
  (I think that) Flimsy ~= less likely to fall down in an earthquake. When I moved from Ireland to California I moved into a two storey (1940s?) apartment apparently constructed from drinking straws and toilet paper. But… a few weeks later the area was struck by a significant quake. Part of the freeway fell down. I was woken from sleep by the building swaying and creaking. But it didn’t fall down. Try your Stockholm apartment in that.
  - henrikschroder 4y ago
    This doesn't make sense. The US can obviously build earthquake-proof concrete and steel skyscrapers, just look at the entire SF downtown. So if you can do that, why wouldn't you be able to build earthquake-proof midrise buildings out of concrete and steel? When I lived in SF I was woken one night by an earthquake, the entire 42-story high-rise I was living in was swaying back and forth, but obviously didn't collapse. Sure, I can see how a wooden construction is a cheaper way to make buildings earthquake-proof, but does it really cost that much to earthquake-proof a mid-rise? Or is it not economically feasible to build mid-rises out of anything but wood in the first place?
rqtwteye 4y ago
That’s what I am thinking. It’s hard to imagine a scenario where the brick house I grew up in Germany could burn down but my US house would probably burn completely once the wood in the walls has caught fire.

NickBusey 4y ago

Yes, our obsession with not wanting to burn to death. So weird. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iroquois_Theatre_fire https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iroquois_Theatre_fire Or more recent and relevant, an apartment fire: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2022_Bronx_apartment_fire https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2022_Bronx_apartment_fire

petesergeant 4y ago
Do more Western Europeans burn to death than Americans?
- pessimizer 4y ago
  I feel this is something you can check yourself and bring back to the thread instead of asking rhetorically, as if it's obvious that they don't.

voz_ 4y ago

Europe is behind on a lot of safety infrastructure compared to the US. You frame it as obsession, but really it's just good policy. > which in turn causes the weird housing distribution of North American cities. This is a hilarious misunderstanding of the complex intersection of class divides, race divides, gerrymandering, history (white flight), nimbyism, and for-profit zoning that has led to the current lack of mid-rise affordable housing.

JumpCrisscross 4y ago
> it's just good policy Is there any empirical data on the safety benefits of a second stairwell?
- voz_ 4y ago
  In the spirit of curiosity - how would you go about measuring that? A counterfactual is almost impossible. That being said - when in doubt, I favor more regulation for safety, not less.
  - jeffbee 4y ago
    You could measure it by people who perish in structure fires, a metric on which America is far behind Europe.
    - rwmj 4y ago
      You'd need to weigh that against the costs and lost opportunities. If no one can buy an affordable apartment and overengineering is part of the cause, or if many die because of a car-centric culture because you can't built densely enough, that can be a problem.
      - frickinLasers 4y ago
        I'd wager most of the US deaths occur in single-family homes--in basements (illegally housed), or even while sleeping in rooms with plenty of opportunity for egress.

vkou 4y ago

Fire codes aren't the reason that you can't build in most of North America. NIMBYism, and the cultural obsession with low-density, single-family homes only made possible by car-centric transportation infrastructure is. Which is also in no small part caused by a financial and tenant rights system that pushes people towards home ownership, instead of renting.

astrange 4y ago
Part of the car-centric infrastructure is fire codes. American towns have lots of fire departments which all refuse to buy smaller European-style fire trucks, and all roads have to be built to fit what they buy. European buildings are also less likely to be made out of wood, which is good if you care about fire safety that much.
- vkou 4y ago
  > Part of the car-centric infrastructure is fire codes. No, it's not. Cheap gas[0], giant freaking interstates, and public transit systems (when they are even present) that are very clearly built for the 'poors' are. Another 3% to the per-square-foot-cost of building a multi-tenant building aren't the reason that Houston has 12 and 16-lane highways cutting right through the city, or why it takes an hour to travel by bus in Stockton a distance that you could travel in 10 minutes by car. Fitting fire trucks is a problem for local, last-mile streets[1], not arterials, and availability of arterials (and lack of availability of alternatives) are what plays a large part in how people get around. [0] Under $3.20/gallon in most of the country, compared to over $7/gallon in most of Europe. Not to mention the double-whammy of generally lower[2] European wages. [1] Most American suburbs solve the width-of-last-mile-street problem by simply... Not having sidewalks. It's not like there's anywhere you can walk to from them... [2] Okay, okay, yes, Western European take-home incomes for low-paying jobs tend to be higher than their American counterparts.
  - astrange 4y ago
    I mean I didn't say it was all of it, it's just another small part of it. Those are more important factors, yes, but minor issues by land area are more important if they especially affect urban areas. Parking minimums and setbacks are like that too. > and public transit systems (when they are even present) that are very clearly built for the 'poors' This one's funny because it's true, but the way you write it makes it sound disparaging - whereas if you said they were designed for "equity" then everyone would agree that's what it's for and that it's good. Another way to say it is, American transit planners will happily make a project worse and take longer to build, as long as it reaches poorer communities first.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

orthoxerox 4y ago

There's probably a fire escape somewhere that you haven't noticed. When I lived in a 23-storey building it had a second fire escape stairwell and a fire escape ladder outside next to the garbage chutes. I now live in a 9-storey building and it has a fire escape ladder bolted next to the balconies.

henrikschroder 4y ago
> There's probably a fire escape somewhere that you haven't noticed. No.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

majormajor 4y ago

3-6 story midrises with multiple staircases are all over the place in the USA, but many of them are on larger lots than seem to be being discussed here for Canada. For smaller-footprint (multiple buildings per city block), stairwells in opposite corners seems to be the most common pattern. About six to ten units per floor in a rectangle.