TO:

Vancouver City Council

FROM:

Chief Building Official

SUBJECT:

General Amendments to the Vancouver Building By-law

 

RECOMMENDATION

GENERAL MANAGER'S COMMENTS

COUNCIL POLICY

Under the Vancouver Charter, the City may pass By-laws to regulate the construction of buildings and adopt a code relating to the construction of buildings, with additional changes that Council considers appropriate.

SUMMARY

This report proposes changes to the sprinkler requirements of the Building By-law as they apply to exterior open residential balconies. Specifically it is proposed that:-

BACKGROUND

Sprinklering of multi-unit residential apartment buildings is required to conform to one of two sprinkler standards developed and maintained by the National Fire Protection Association of the U.S. The full sprinkler standard NFPA 13 applies to all multi-unit residential buildings more than four storeys in building height and to all non-residential buildings. This standard was first developed in 1896 primarily for the protection of large industrial occupancies such as factories and warehouses. It has gone through numerous changes and technological upgrades since, culminating in the 1999 edition currently in use in the City.

In 1975, the NFPA developed the NFPA 13D sprinkler standard for one and two family dwellings. This was followed in 1989 by the NFPA 13R standard for multi-unit residential buildings up to four storeys in building height. Both these standards were developed as lower cost sprinkler standards which have life safety as their primary goal and property protection as a secondary goal. They were developed as a result of recommendations made in the 1971 US Presidential Commission on Fire Prevention and Control entitled "America Burning". Significant discussion arose in the North American fire protection community over the level of protection afforded by these standards, particularly over the NFPA 13R standard whose implementation was delayed for 13 years, largely as a consequence of this debate.

Prior to adoption of the 1999 update of our Building By-law, the By-law required all multi-unit residential buildings with more than 4 dwelling units to be sprinklered to the full NFPA 13 standard. Only multi-unit buildings with four or less units were permitted to use the lesser NFPA 13R standard which exempted the non-habitable and exterior areas of such buildings including balconies and porches from requiring sprinklers.

With adoption of the current 1999 Building By-law, the NFPA 13R standard was permitted to be used for all four storey residential buildings. This change effectively waived the requirement for sprinkler protection of exterior balconies in all wood frame multi-unit residential buildings.
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Changes to the building by-law to require automatic sprinkler protection of the balconies of multi-unit residential buildings where the framing or the cladding is of combustible construction, were included in a package of Building By-law amendments last year at the request of the Fire and Rescue Service. These were presented to the Planning and Environment Committee on July 18th 2002. Due largely to the concerns expressed at that time by the Urban Development Institute, the proposal to sprinkler the residential balconies of combustible construction was excluded from the package of approved amendments.

Recently, an interpretation was received from the NFPA which stated that residential balconies should be considered under the sprinkler standard NFPA 13 as areas where combustible materials could be stored. Accordingly, this would require that the balconies of all multi-unit (non-combustible) residential buildings more than 4 storeys in building height should be sprinklered.

In summary, the current sprinkler installation standards provide that the balconies of combustible buildings are not required to be sprinklered while the balconies of non-combustible residential buildings more than four storeys in height are required to be sprinklered. While there is a valid rationale for this situation, it appears somewhat inconsistent when viewed in the context of Vancouver's urban development and fire department experience.

DISCUSSION

Since adoption of the NFPA 13R standard in 1999, the Fire Department has expressed a significant concern with the risks associated with the spread of fire from the exterior balconies of wood frame residential buildings. These fire risks are related to the potential use of exterior balconies for the storage and/or operation of cooking appliances such as gas barbeques. The Fire Department has made a request to amend the Building By-law to require that automatic sprinkler protection be required for exterior balconies of wood frame residential buildings.

Recently, the City of Vancouver Fire Department has reported two exterior balcony fires that spread to other apartments within a building. These fires were caused by the use of gas barbeques on an exterior balcony. The National Research Council of Canada has also expressed concerns related to the spread of fire via exterior balconies. A study carried out by the National Research Council concluded that in a recent apartment fire in Quebec, fire spread easily to four suites via exterior combustible balconies of a multi-unit wood frame residential building, thus defeating the interior fire separations required between individual suites. These fire separations are required to have a standard fire endurance rating of one hour. This should allow the fire to be confined to the suite of fire origin and give time for the building to be evacuated and the fire department to bring the fire under control. In the event of fire jumping from one balcony to another in a wood frame building, these fire separations may be readily by-passed and by involving more than one suite, defeat the ability of the interior sprinklers to prevent the fire from spreading into the suites.

When the City recently received information from the NFPA that the balconies of residential buildings should be considered as areas where combustible materials could be stored, it became apparent that all residential balconies in buildings greater than four storeys in height should be sprinklered under the NFPA 13 Standard. Subsequently, the City was approached by a major developer of residential buildings expressing concern at this ruling and the impact it would have on the form of many contemporary high rise residential developments.

Typically, these developments are constructed with large areas of full height curtain wall glazing installed between concrete floors. Installation of exterior sprinklers can present problems in routing the water lines where the soffit of the concrete floor slabs is finished and exposed to provide the ceiling of the unit below, and where sprinklering is largely achieved by means of sidewall heads with piping routed through interior partitions.

Given the continuing concerns of our fire department, and the concerns raised by the development industry, it is recommended that exterior balcony sprinklers be provided only where they would be most effective, namely for combustible buildings. Overall, this policy would result in a net reduction in the number of balconies required to be sprinklered. It is notconsidered that deleting the requirement for sprinklers from residential balconies of open non-combustible buildings would be detrimental to their fire safety. These buildings afford little or no potential for fire spread from balcony to balcony, and the City has not experienced fire safety problems associated with balcony fires of buildings constructed during the years when this exemption was previously in effect under our building by-law

While it is Council policy to adhere as closely as possible to the British Columbia Building Code, it is considered that this change provides a significant public benefit at no net cost increase to the construction industry. It should also be noted that the proposed changes are to the NFPA standards referenced in the code rather than to the British Columbia Building Code. These NFPA standards are developed in the US and are not always fully harmonized with Canadian codes and standards of practice.

IMPLEMENTATION

Should Council approve these amendments, staff recommend that they be enacted without undue delay. If Council adopts the amendments proposed in this report, they will only be applicable for building permit applications made on or after the enactment date of the By-law amendments. This should give sufficient time for sprinkler designs to be modified as required, as these are typically designed by specialty firms after the contract has been let and the building permit issued.

PUBLIC CONSULTATION

This report was circulated for review and comments to the Certified Professional Committee (CP Committee) on which representatives from UDI, AIBC and APEGBC sit. They commented as follows:-

These recommendations are considered to be appropriate and are incorporated in the proposed changes.

CONCLUSION

The proposed amendments to the Vancouver Building By-law represent an improvement over the current By-law which would warrant the change. Staff believe that the amendments related to automatic sprinkler protection on exterior balconies will increase the level of fire safety intended by the Building By-law whilst not having any significant adverse effect on the construction industry.

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© 2002 City of Vancouver