Re:Whatever Happened to Fire Escapes
by mindslight on Thursday October 22, 2026 @12:54PM
(#50197992)
> So we should all just bend over and take it quietly when the requirements are not just stupid but stupid for bad reasons?
Your mistake seems to be assuming omniscience. You are the one asserting something is "stupid for bad reasons" as if it's universally applicable. While I may even agree with your assessment, I still recognize that I haven't put nearly as much effort into making that judgement as a standards body.
The extra cost of installing unnecessary fire escapes, or AFCI's, or whatever else might be mandated by code but not particularly effective, isn't anywhere near the top of my list of hills to die on. I'm perfectly content to defer to their judgement, even if it errs on the side of expensive rather than unsafe [0]. That's kind of the whole point of building codes - setting a minimum standard so most people can move on to focusing on other problems, rather than needing to spend their effort continually evaluating whether the roof over their head is going to fall down.
> About 50yr. So for ~50yr they were GTG for new construction
I can't quite tell the argument you're making. My point was that with mandatory fire escapes being a fixed quantity, the market had to transition to the different building designs on its own, in order for it to be demonstrated that fire escapes were not necessary. It would sure be great if in the middle of that 100 year span (IIUC), someone had a crystal ball that said fire escapes wouldn't be necessary going forward. Unfortunately we live in the real world where P != NP (by everything we've seen) and path dependence is a thing.
[0] my point with the GFCI on a sump pump is that it's erring on the side of significant property damage, versus a tiny shock risk while performing maintenance.
Your mistake seems to be assuming omniscience. You are the one asserting something is "stupid for bad reasons" as if it's universally applicable. While I may even agree with your assessment, I still recognize that I haven't put nearly as much effort into making that judgement as a standards body.
The extra cost of installing unnecessary fire escapes, or AFCI's, or whatever else might be mandated by code but not particularly effective, isn't anywhere near the top of my list of hills to die on. I'm perfectly content to defer to their judgement, even if it errs on the side of expensive rather than unsafe [0]. That's kind of the whole point of building codes - setting a minimum standard so most people can move on to focusing on other problems, rather than needing to spend their effort continually evaluating whether the roof over their head is going to fall down.
> About 50yr. So for ~50yr they were GTG for new construction
I can't quite tell the argument you're making. My point was that with mandatory fire escapes being a fixed quantity, the market had to transition to the different building designs on its own, in order for it to be demonstrated that fire escapes were not necessary. It would sure be great if in the middle of that 100 year span (IIUC), someone had a crystal ball that said fire escapes wouldn't be necessary going forward. Unfortunately we live in the real world where P != NP (by everything we've seen) and path dependence is a thing.
[0] my point with the GFCI on a sump pump is that it's erring on the side of significant property damage, versus a tiny shock risk while performing maintenance.