2707 COLBY AVE BASE FILE 2018-01-02 MF Import

HQ_3 APPEAL NUMBER TWO Appellant: JDH Limited, letter attached Issue: 1. Secondary water supply for automatic sprinkler system. 2. Protection of exterior openings. I. The UBC Section (1807) addressing high rise buildings requires "in seismic zones 2, 3 & 4 in addition to the main water supply, a secondary on -site supply of water..." The size of this supply is a function of the sprinkler design demand plus 100 gallons per minute for 30 minutes. A building of this size would require approximately 12,000 to 16,000 gallons. The Cities of Portland and Bellevue adhere to this requirement. Although the applicant may have received some contrary information from Bellevue staff. The City of Seattle does provide an alternative although Tom Kinsman, the supervisor of plan review and Seattle's liaison with the Structural Engineers seismic studies, has serious reservations regarding Seattle's current policy. The standards of fire and life safety in high-rise buildings is addressed by Vincent Bush in the following paragraphs. Section 1807 encompasses special life -safety requirements for high-rise office buildings, apartment houses and hotels. The comparatively good fire record notwithstanding, particularly in office buildings, a recent spate of fires in high-rise buildings prompted government at all levels to develop special regulations concerning life safety in high-rise buildings. Despite the fact that "it would take 400 years for the number of fire deaths in high-rise buildings to equal the total deaths due to fire in one year in one and two family dwellings, the potential for disaster due to the large number of occupants in high-rise buildings has resulted in the provisions now included in Section 1807. The high-rise building is characterized by several features: ■ It is impractical, if not impossible, to completely evacuate the building within a reasonable period of time. ■ Prompt rescue will be difficult, and the probability of lighting a fire in upper stories from the exterior will be low. ■ High-rise buildings are occupied by large numbers of people, and in hotels and apartment houses, the occupants may be asleep during an emergency. ■ A potential exists for stack effect. The stack effect can result in the distribution of smoke and other products of combustion throughout the height of a high-rise building during a fire. The provisions in Section 1807 are designed to account for the features described above. Evo-'o +i— � mokv cal � -A�-