Mid-rise single stair apartments

[nortor]

Harvard’s Joint Center for Housing Studies, Boston Indicators, and Utile have a new report out advocating changing the Mass. building code to allow up to six-story single stair housing. This could be a game changer for building dense housing on small lots and allow for a greater variety of housing typologies (esp. family sized units) in apartments.

Legalizing Mid-Rise Single-Stair Housing in Massachusetts

There is a growing recognition that zoning reform alone won’t solve the housing crisis. This report examines staircases and the common building code

www.jchs.harvard.edu

 

[stick n move]

I’ve been seeing this gaining more and more steam lately and Im a big fan. I think it would help change the perception of new development because everything wouldnt have to be the stereotypical 5 over 1 shape which are becoming very unpopular with the general public. Plus having more buildings per street allows for more vibrant neighborhoods compared to just 1 building taking up an entire city block. Thats not to say dont build any more 5 over 1s they definitely have their place, but they shouldnt be the only thing being built everywhere.

Having 2 stair wells inherently leads to wide boxy shaped buildings because you have to spread the stair wells apart a certain distance. Having a single stair well allows you to wrap the units around the stair well and have much more slender buildings that better blend into existing neighborhoods. Plus the single stair well requirement allows you to build less units meaning a cheaper overall development because the 2 stair well requirement essentially creates a minimum viable building size based around the minimum distance required for the stair wells to be apart from each other per the fire code. If youre building a 6 story building the 2 stair wells need to be x amount of feet away from each other so the width of the building cannot be any shorter than this requirement and so you end up with a lot of buildings with the same boxy dimensions. With a single stair well requirement though you would be able to build many different shape and sized buildings depending on the requirements of the site all the way down to dutch style very slender buildings that are still 6 stories if you wanted to. I think this would be a very welcomed change.

 

[FahrradFahren]

In buildings on a smaller lot it's just comical how much space two stairwells take up, and how close to each other they are. Take a look at this building in Roxbury (slide 27 is a good overview of the floor plan).

 

[FahrradFahren]

This design competition has some great discussion and new ideas for urban density that could be achieved with specific zoning and building code changes (the two-stairwell requirement comes up a lot). The competition was organized by the Vancouver Urbanarium Society and as such I think it focuses on laws in British Columbia. However, due to the similarity in zoning codes and urban development history across North America there's some great ideas here that could apply to the Boston area.

Decoding Density competition
Full digital publication of designs submitted

 

[#bancars]

This design competition has some great discussion and new ideas for urban density that could be achieved with specific zoning and building code changes (the two-stairwell requirement comes up a lot). The competition was organized by the Vancouver Urbanarium Society and as such I think it focuses on laws in British Columbia. However, due to the similarity in zoning codes and urban development history across North America there's some great ideas here that could apply to the Boston area.

Decoding Density competition
Full digital publication of designs submitted

The About Here video on this topic in connection with the competition is great:

 

[stick n move]

From last month

https://www.masslive.com/news/2024/...-construction-report-says.html?outputType=amp

 

[BOS2BON]

Does anyone know if the legislature is looking into what the single-stair report wrote about? I'm not that keyed into what goes on in Beacon Hill.

 

[KCasiglio]

Does anyone know if the legislature is looking into what the single-stair report wrote about? I'm not that keyed into what goes on in Beacon Hill.

Mariano is my rep, I'll email the report to him later today and if I hear anything back I'll share it here.

 

[Justbuildit]

I had a bit of free time today and sent this off to my state rep and senator. Feel free to crib from this text if you find it helpful. Your state rep/senator can be found by entering your address at

Find My Legislator

malegislature.gov

This topic is so boring and esoteric that it seems like one of those issues that could actually bubble up with a bit of grass roots effort. Even better if you can badger someone at a neighborhood meeting. Up next, parking minimums for City of Boston housing regs.




Hello [REPRESENTATIVE/SENATOR], my name is [NAME] and I'm a constituent of yours in [DISTRICT]. I'm writing in regards to a recent study from Harvard's Joint Center for Housing Studies that was published last month that speaks to an important issue in zoning and housing construction. As you may know, the current zoning restrictions in many parts of the US add burdensome delays to housing construction and add costs that often necessitate high price "luxury" units that exacerbate the missing middle housing crisis, especially in urban areas. This is further compounded by extremely high land prices in places like Boston.

One simple solution that addresses these issues and has been adapted in other parts of the world is to permit single-stair housing for low- and mid-rise developments, freeing more square footage for living space and increasing value for residents and land-owners alike.

As detailed in the report, linked below, the US has historically required redundant staircases for these developments in the name of fire safety. With advances in sprinklers, fire resistant materials, smoke detection, and rapid fire response, this additional cost has become unnecessary. Furthermore, despite greater density, per capita fire deaths are substantially lower in most European nations than in the United States (see report).

I'd strongly recommend that your office review this report and consider its recommendations for future amendments to the Commonwealth's building and housing codes, beginning on page 27. These simple changes will accelerate and simplify housing policy in our state and would be an easy, cost-free change resulting in positive sum value for our residents.

Thank you for your time, and I look forward to continued engagement with your office.

Best,
[NAME]


https://www.jchs.harvard.edu/resear...g-mid-rise-single-stair-housing-massachusetts