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The most important and immediate concern to the Portland Cement
Association are trends in relaxed fire protection provisions in
building codes combined with the latest trends in housing our nation’s
elderly, disabled, and young.
Multi-Family Fire Safety
Provided are links to information on key issues related to code
provisions that provide adequate life safety and property protection
for occupants and safety for emergency responders in multi-family
construction including but not limited to apartments, condominiums,
dormitories, hotels, motels, housing for the elderly, assisted living,
and nursing homes.
Below find more detailed resources and
specific amendments to modify the International
Building Code to require minimum two-hour non-combustible construction
between living units in multi-family dwellings.
Resources: Articles
and brochures addressing fire safety for multi-family construction
Non-combustible Concrete Construction – Life
Safety for Multi-Family Homes This eight-page fire
safety promotional publication addresses issues related to the balanced
design for life safety and property protection in multi-family construction.
Testimonials on the fire performance of multi-family construction
are combined with statistics on fire deaths, injuries and property
loss and the effectiveness of sprinklers and detection systems.
Building officials are urged to assure multi-family homes are constructed
with all three components of balanced fire-safe design. More.
To order the printed publication in packs of 50, click
here.
Open-Forum – Are We Protected from Fire in Buildings
This article in question and answer format addresses issues related
to fire safety in buildings: 1) active versus passive fire protection,
2) sprinkler operation, 3) perceived level of safety, 4) emphasis
in provisions for sprinklers, 5) perceptions about sprinklers versus
compartmentation, 6) balanced design, 7) redundancy in protection,
8) costs, 9) costs and other code provisions, 10) imbalance in protection,
11) national versus local disasters, 12) influence of national security
and disaster relief, 13) trends influencing building codes, 14)
emphasis on multi-family construction 15) role of cost in decision
making, 16) other occupancies, 17) making changes, and 18) will
improvements happen. Click
here for pdf of article.
Fire Protection Planning Reports - A Series
From 1975 to 1995 the Fire Safety Committee of the Concrete and
Masonry Industry published a series of reports on fire safety and
protection. The series addressed codes and standards and specific
types of construction with an emphasis on residential construction
where most fire deaths occur. While some of the information is dated,
most of the information and recommendations remain appropriate today.
These publications are provided in a pdf format for your review.
Three of the reports, indicated as direct links, remain available
for purchase from the PCA bookstore. Click
here for a list of the reports with summaries.
Amendments:
Modifications for the International Building Code Providing for
Minimum 2-hr Noncombustible Construction for Multi-Family Housing
Modifications to tables and text in the 2003 or 2006 International
Building Code are required to achieve 2-hour fire separations between
guest rooms in motels/hotels, dwelling units of apartments, dormitories
and units in assisted living facilities Group I-1. These changes
will require minimum 2-hour noncombustible construction. While this
permits concrete and masonry construction it does not eliminate
light-gauge steel stud construction with an appropriate number of
layers of wallboard. Modifications to the IBC are shown with deletion
of existing text as strike-through and addition of new or replacement
text as underlined.
Modifications
for the 2003 International Building Code (IBC)
Modifications for the 2006 International Building Code (IBC)
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