Category Archives: Architectural/Hammurabi

Loading
loading...

Occupancy Classification and Use

 

In educational settings, where large numbers of students, staff, and visitors gather, these rules protect vulnerable populations, especially children, who may lack the awareness or ability to respond quickly in emergencies. Proper classification ensures adequate exits, fire-resistant materials, and ventilation suited for classrooms or assembly areas like auditoriums.
These classifications also inform zoning, insurance, and funding by aligning facilities with educational purposes.

Libraries are multi-functional spaces and at the physical, and the heart, of any school, college or university.   We take special interest in this discussion.    Leaving the evolution toward “media centers” aside, the relevant passage in the current International Building Code that applies to library occupancy classification and use is linked below:

Chapter 3 Occupancy Classification and Use

 

The original University of Michigan advocacy enterprise may have raised the level of debate on structural engineering three cycles ago.  Without any specific interest from attendees we will review our proposals in previous revision cycles:

  1. Education facilities as storm shelters
  2. Enhanced classroom acoustics
  3. Carbon monoxide detection in Group E occupancies
  4. Locking arrangements in educational occupancies
  5. Interior lighting power allowances for classrooms
  6. Occupancy sensors for classrooms
  7. Automatic control of receptacle power in classrooms and laboratories
  8. Expansion of voltage drop requirements into customer-owned service conductors

This is about as much as we can sort through this week.  We will host another focus teleconference next week.  See our CALENDAR for the date.

Finally, we persist in encouraging education industry facility managers (especially those with operations and maintenance data) to participate in the ICC code development process.  You may do so by CLICKING HERE.

Real asset managers for school districts, colleges, universities and technical schools in the Albuquerque region should take advantage of the opportunity to observe the ICC code-development process.   The Group B Hearings are usually webcast — and we will signal the link to the 10-day webcast when it becomes available — but the experience of seeing how building codes are determined is enlightening when you can watch it live and on site.

 

Issue: [16-169]

Category: Architectural, Facility Asset Management, Space Planning

Colleagues: Mike Anthony, Jack Janveja, Richard Robben

#StandardsNewMexico


LEARN MORE:

ICC Group B Code Development Schedule

Little Big Horn College

 

 

 

 

 

Every month we direct our colleagues in the education industry to the US Census Department’s monthly construction report to make a point: at an average annual clip of about $75 billion, the education industry is the largest non-residential building construction market in the United States.  A large part of that construction involves infrastructure upgrades of existing buildings that contribute to sustainability goals but may not make flashy architectural statements for philanthropists.

EDUCATION INDUSTRY CONSTRUCTION SPEND

The International Existing Building Code (IEBC) is a model code in the International Code Council family of codes intended to provide requirements for repair and alternative approaches for alterations and additions to existing buildings (LEARN MORE).  A large number of existing buildings and structures do not comply with the current building code requirements for new construction.  Although many of these buildings are potentially salvageable, rehabilitation is often cost-prohibitive because compliance with all the new requirements for new construction could require extensive changes that go well beyond the value of building or the original scope of the alteration.

Education facility planners, architects and managers: Sound familiar?

ICC administered workgroups have been convening with considerable frequency over the past several months to pull together a number of relevant concepts for the next (2019 Group B) revision.  For the purpose of providing some perspective on the complexity and subtlety of the issues in play, a partial overview of working group activity is available in the links below.  Keep in mind that there are many other proposals being developed by our ICC working group and others.

IEBC Healthcare for BCAC December 11 2018

16-169 IEBC BCC Worksheet October 2-3 2018

There are other many other issues we have been tracking.  The foregoing simply presents the level of detail and subtlety that is noteworthy.

On Tuesday the ICC has released its the complete monograph for use at the Group B Committee Action Hearings, April 28-May 8 at the Albuquerque Convention Center:

2019 Group B Proposed Changes

It is a large document — 2919 pages — so keep that in mind when accessing it.  There are many issues affecting #TotalCostofOwnership of the education facility industry so we will get cracking on it again next week.   See our CALENDAR for the next online teleconference.  Use the login credentials at the upper right of our home page.

Finally, we persist in encouraging education industry facility managers (especially those with operations and maintenance data) to participate in the ICC code development process.  You may do so by CLICKING HERE.   Real asset managers for school districts, colleges, universities and technical schools in the Albuquerque region should take advantage of the opportunity to observe the ICC code-development process.   The Group B Hearings are usually webcast — and we will signal the link to the 10-day webcast when it becomes available — but the experience of seeing how building codes are determined is enlightening when you can watch it live and on site.

 

Issue: [16-169]

Category: Architectural, Facility Asset Management, Space Planning

Colleagues: Mike Anthony, Jack Janveja, Richard Robben

#StandardsNewMexico


LEARN MORE:

ICC Group B Code Development Schedule

Little Big Horn College

 

 

 

 

Finish Carpentry Installation

University of Southern California

The Architectural Woodwork Institute (AWI) seeks to be the global leader in architectural woodwork standards and related interior finishes.   It has released a redline for public review and comment its standard AWI 0620 Finish Carpentry/Installation.   AWI 0620 is written to provide comprehensive guidelines for the installation and finishing of architectural woodwork and related interior products.  This standard should be important to the largest non-residential building construction market in the United States.

Comments are due  August 20th.  You may obtain an electronic copy from: agoodin@awinet.org.  Send your comments to the same email address (with copy to psa@ansi.org).  All consensus standards involving the architectural trades are on the agenda of our weekly Open Door teleconference — every Wednesday, 11 AM Eastern time  (CLICK HERE to log in).  Additionally, we have set aside an hour per month to run through all consensus documents that are referenced in typical design, construction, operations & maintenance contracts.  The next teleconference is scheduled for July 23rd, 11 AM Eastern time, as described in the link below:

Design Guidelines & Specifications

Issue: [18-189]

Category; Architectural

ANSI Standards Action Notice | PDF Page 7


McMaster University

Interior Finishes & Wood

International Building Code Chapter 23: Wood

“Office in a Small City” 1953 Edward Hopper

Chapter 8 of the International Building Code contains the performance requirements for controlling fire growth and smoke propagation within buildings by restricting interior finish and decorative materials.  A great deal of interior square footage presents fire hazard; even bulletin boards and decorations; as a simple web search will reveal.  We are respectful of the competing requirements of safety and ambience and try to assist in a reconciliation of these two objectives.

Free access to the current edition of the relevant section is linked below:

CHAPTER 8: Interior Finishes

The public input period of the Group A Codes — which includes the International Fire Code; which contains parent requirements for this chapter — closed in July 2nd.  Search on the word “interior”, or “school” or “classroom “in the document linked below for a sample of the ideas in play.

Update to the 2024 Group A – Consolidated Monograph Updates 3/18/2024

2021 REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE ACTION HEARINGS ON THE 2021 EDITIONS OF THE GROUP A INTERNATIONAL CODES

Development of Group A proceeds in the calendar linked below:

Current Code Development Cycle 2024-2026

Most of the ICC bibliography lies at the foundation of the safety and sustainability agenda of education communities everywhere so we follow development continuously; setting priorities according to our resources.  We keep the issues in this chapter on the standing agenda of our Interiors colloquium.  See our CALENDAR for the next online meeting; open to everyone.

Kindergarten

International Building Code: Group A Model Building Codes: 2024/2025/2026 Development Cycle

 

“One Hundred Children Playing in the Spring” | Su Hanchen 蘇漢臣

Safety and sustainability for any facility begins with an understanding of who shall occupy the built environment and how.  University settings, with mixed-use phenomenon arising spontaneously and temporarily, often present challenges.   Educational communities are a convergent settings for families; day care facilities among them.  First principles regarding occupancy classifications for day care facilities appear in Section 308 of the International Building Code, Institutional Group I; linked below:

Section 308 | International Building Code

The ICC Institutional Group I-4 classification includes buildings and structures occupied by more than five persons of any age who received custodial care for fewer than 24 hours per day by persons other than parents or guardian, relatives by blood, marriage or adoption, and in a place other than the home of the person cared far.  This group includes both adult and child day care.

We maintain focus on child day care.  Many educational communities operate child day care enterprises for both academic study and/or as auxiliary (university employee benefit) enterprises.

Princeton University Child Care Center

Each of the International Code Council code development groups fetch back to a shared understanding of the nature of the facility; character of its occupants and prospective usage patterns.

The Group B developmental cycle ended in December 2019.  The 2021 revision of the International Building code is in production now, though likely slowed down because of the pandemic.   Ahead of the formal, market release of the Group B tranche of titles, you can sample the safety concepts in play during this revision with an examination of the documents linked below:

2019 GROUP B PROPOSED CHANGES TO THE I-CODES ALBUQUERQUE COMMITTEE ACTION HEARINGS

2019 REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE ACTION HEARINGS ON THE 2018 EDITIONS OF THE GROUP B INTERNATIONAL CODES

Search on the terms “day care” and “daycare” to get a sample of the prevailing concepts; use of such facilities as storm shelters, for example.

“The Country School” | Winslow Homer

We encourage our safety and sustainability colleagues to participate directly in the ICC Code Development process.   We slice horizontally through the disciplinary silos (“incumbent verticals”) created by hundreds of consensus product developers every week and we can say, upon considerable authority that the ICC consensus product development environment is one of the best in the world.  Privately developed standards (for use by public agencies) is a far better way to discover and promulgate leading practice than originating technical specifics from legislative bodies.   CLICK HERE to get started.  Contact Kimberly Paarlberg (kpaarlberg@iccsafe.org) for more information.

There are competitor consensus products in this space — Chapter 18 Day-Care Occupancies in NFPA 5000 Building Construction and Safety Code, for example; a title we maintain the standing agenda of our Model Building Code teleconferences.   It is developed from a different pool of expertise under a different due process regime.   See our CALENDAR for the next online meeting; open to everyone.

 

Issue: [18-166]

Category: Architectural, Healthcare Facilities, Facility Asset Management

Colleagues: Mike Anthony, Jim Harvey, Richard Robben


Several names for this occupancy class:

  1. Nursery
  2. Crèche
  3. Playgroup
  4. Montessori
  5. Preschool
  6. Kindergarten
  7. Childcare
  8. Toddler group
  9. Daycare
  10. Early learning center

A Study of Children’s Password Practices

 

National Design Specification for Wood Construction

“The Country School” 1871 Winslow Homer

The 2024 National Design Specification for Wood Construction was developed by AWC’s Wood Design Standards Committee and approved as a standard by ANSI (American National Standards Institute) on October 16, 2023.  The 2024 NDS is referenced in the 2024 International Building Code.

FREE ACCESS

International Code Council Mass Timber: Outcomes of the ICC Tall Wood Ad Hoc Committee

The Old Schoolhouse | Flint Creek Oklahoma

Related:

Researchers Make Wood Stronger than Steel

Catalog: BUILDERS HARDWARE MANUFACTURER ASSOCIATION

 

Builders Hardware Manufacturer Association Standards Catalog


ARCHIVE: April 6, 2019

The Builders Hardware Manufacturers Association (BHMA) is an ANSI accredited standards developing organization for building access and egress technology that education industry real asset managers find referenced deep in the architectural and electrical sections of construction contract specifications (as in “Conform to all applicable standards”).  Architects, electrical, fire protection and information and communications technology professionals usually have to collaborate on the design, construction. operations and maintenance of fenestration technologies.

Gone are the days when a door was just a door (or “opening” or “fenestration”).   Doors are now portals; an easily identifiable control point in the Internet of Things electrotechnical transformation.  There are 100’s of thousands of them on large research university campus; for example.  As we explain in our School Security Standards post the pace of standardization in public safety management and technology has increased; driven by events.  Some of the risk management can be accomplished with integrated technical solutions that are complex and more expensive to design, build, operate and maintain.

A fair estimate of the annualized cost of a door now runs on the order of $1000 to $10,000 per door (with hospital doors at the high end).

Loreto Secondary School | Kilkenny, Ireland

BHMA develops and maintains performance standards for locks, closers, exit devices and other builders hardware.  It has more than 40 ANSI/BHMA  standards. The widely known ANSI/BHMA A156 series of standards describes and establishes features and criteria for an array of builders hardware products including locks, closers, exit devices, butts, hinges, power-operated doors and access control products.   They are listed on the link below:

BHMA Standards Home Page

BHMA has opened one of its standards for public review that is relevant to our contribution to the security and sustainability agenda of the education facility industry; an agenda that necessarily involves a growing constellation of interacting specifics

BHMA A156.4 Standard for Door Controls – Closers.  This Standard contains requirements for door closers surface mounted, concealed in the door, overhead concealed, and concealed in the floor. Also included are pivots for floor closers. Criteria for conformance include cycle, operational, closing force, and finish tests.

Given that BHMA consensus products are largely product standards (much the same way UL Standards are product standards) it is wise to keep an eye on a related installation standards found in the fenestration sections of model building and fire safety codes and in ASTM E2112  Standard Practice for Installation of Exterior Windows, Doors and Skylights.

Comments are due May 6th.  You may obtain an electronic copies of any of the foregoing from MTierney@kellencompany.com and send comments to the same (with copy to psa@ansi.org).

Roxbury Community College | Roxbury Crossing, Massachusetts

The BHMA suite is on the standing agenda of our monthly Construction Specification and Design Guideline teleconference; an informal session that should interest building contractors and design professionals who prepare documents that use the general purpose clause: “Conform to all applicable standards”.   That usually means the latest standard.  See our CALENDAR for the next online meeting; open to everyone.

 

Issue: [19-129]

Category: Architectural, Electrical, Facility Asset Management, Telecommunication, Public Safety, #SmartCampus, Risk Management

Colleagues: Mike Anthony, Jim Harvey. Jim Vibbart

 


LEARN MORE:

BHMA Standards Revision Status Tracking

 

 

Details

This content is accessible to paid subscribers. To view it please enter your password below or send mike@standardsmichigan.com a request for subscription details.

Global Consistency in Presenting Construction & Life Cycle Costs

Research from the World Economic Forum has shown that improvements in the design and construction process can be achieved by using international standards like ICMS to gain comparable and consistent data. ICMS provides a high-level structure and format for classifying, defining, measuring, recording, analysing and presenting construction and other life-cycle costs.

CLICK ON IMAGE


Architectural “Neighborhoods”

This content is accessible to paid subscribers. To view it please enter your password below or send mike@standardsmichigan.com a request for subscription details.

Layout mode
Predefined Skins
Custom Colors
Choose your skin color
Patterns Background
Images Background
error: Content is protected !!
Skip to content