Today we continue drilling into the transcript of proposed changes the International Code Council Group B tranche of titles relevant to our safety and sustainability agenda with particular interest in places of assembly for athletic activity. Use the login credentials at the upper right of our home page.
Today during our usual hour we sweep through standards action in building glazing, entrances and means of egress. The word fenestration (Latin: fenestra) has become a term of art for the design, construction, and placement of openings in a building, including windows, doors, skylights, and other glazed elements. While the word has sparse use in the International Code Council and National Fire Protection Association catalog it is widely used by the Construction Specifications Institute in its MasterFormat system for organizing construction standards, guidelines and building contracts.
The percentage of a building envelope “skin” that is comprised of doors and windows varies depending on the specific building design, function, and location. However, a commonly cited range is between 15% to 25% of the total building envelope. The actual percentage will depend on several factors such as the building’s purpose, orientation, local climate, and energy performance goals. Buildings that require more natural light or ventilation, such as schools, hospitals, and offices, may have a higher percentage of windows and doors in their envelope. In contrast, buildings with lower lighting and ventilation requirements, such as warehouses, may have a smaller percentage of windows and doors.
Fenestration presents elevated risk to facility managers. The education facility industry is a large target and a pattern of settling out of court. For example:
In 2013, a former student at Yale University sued the school over a broken window in her dorm room. The student alleged that the university was negligent in failing to repair the window, which allowed a burglar to enter her room and sexually assault her. The case was settled out of court in 2015 for an undisclosed amount.
In 2019, a student at the University of California, Los Angeles sued the school over a broken window in her apartment. The student alleged that the university was negligent in failing to repair the window, which allowed a swarm of bees to enter her apartment and sting her. The case was settled out of court for $4.5 million.
In 2020, a group of students at Harvard University sued the school over its decision to require them to move out of their dorms due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The students alleged that the university breached its contract with them by failing to provide suitable alternative housing, including functioning windows and doors. (The case is ongoing; best we can tell as of the date of this post).
These cases illustrate that colleges and universities can face legal action related to doors and windows, either due to alleged negligence in maintaining or repairing them, or due to issues related to student housing and accommodations.
Our inquiry breaks down into two modules at the moment:
The latest version of the ICC/MBI Standard 1200 is the 2020 edition, specifically the ICC/MBI 1200-2020: Standard for Off-Site Construction: Planning, Design, Fabrication and Assembly. This standard, developed by the International Code Council (ICC) in collaboration with the Modular Building Institute (MBI), addresses the planning, design, fabrication, and assembly of off-site construction projects. It is part of a series of standards aimed at ensuring safety and compliance in off-site construction processes.
US Offsite partnered with RSA to design, manufacture, and deliver five new modular buildings that met California’s snow-load standards and doubled classroom capacity — all in under 10 months.
Today we run through recent action in fire safety best practice literature. Even though fire safety technologies comprise about 2-4 percent of a new building budget, the influence of the fire safety culture dominates all aspects campus safety; cybersecurity of public safety communication technology for example.
A small sample of the issues we have tracked in the past: (2002-2023). Items in RED indicate success in reducing cost with no reduction in safety (i.e. successful rebuttal, typically market-making by incumbents)
Limiting vendor lock-in (promote interoperability) in building additions.
Limiting the tendency to lowball first cost in order to achieve vendor lock-in later in the facility life-cycle
Scalability of fire safety professional certification
Sprinklering of off-campus student housing
Advocating central (or campus district) fire pump systems
One of the newer issues to revisit over the past few years is the fire safety of tents. Many colleges and universities are setting up large commercial tents outside buildings (within range of Wi-Fi) for students to congregate, study and dine. We are also seeing back and forth on fire safety in theatrical performance venues in the International Code Council building safety catalog.
We approach these titles with an eye toward driving risk-informed, performance requirements that reduce risk and cost for the user interest; while recognizing the responsibility of competitor stakeholders. It is not a friendly space for the user-interest who seeks to optimally resolve the competing requirements of safety and economy. Vertical incumbents completely dominate this domain.
That’s a wrap on our 2024 open days! Thank you to everyone who came to visit us this year and to all of our wonderful staff and students who supported these events. ✨
New update alert! The 2022 update to the Trademark Assignment Dataset is now available online. Find 1.29 million trademark assignments, involving 2.28 million unique trademark properties issued by the USPTO between March 1952 and January 2023: https://t.co/njrDAbSpwBpic.twitter.com/GkAXrHoQ9T
