Sec. 494(27). Exits required.
(a) The term "floor area" as used in this subsection shall
mean the entire floor space between exterior walls and fire walls.
(b) In every building hereafter erected, except in private
dwellings less than four stories, each floor area above the first
shall be provided with at least two means of egress remote from
each other, and if over two stories high, one egress from each
floor, which shall be enclosed stairway as provided by subsection
21, or a doorway in a fire wall leading to another floor area separately
provided with adequate stairs or other independent
means of exit. Such doorway serving as an emergency exit in
a fire wall shall be protected by an automatic and self-closing
fire door as specified in subsection 20. No portion of any floor
area shall be more than one hundred (100) feet from a place of
egress. Where two means of egress are required in this subsection,
one may be omitted if fireproof construction is used as
specified in subsection 21. Elevators shall not be considered as a
means of egress as specified in this subsection.
(c) Except in dwellings, no required stairway shall be less
than 44 inches wide, and the total width of exit doorways leading
therefrom shall at least be equal to the total width of the
stairways which they serve.
(d) The total width of stairway, interior and exterior, provided
for the occupancy of each floor and those above, shall be
not less than 44 inches for the first 50 persons, and 12 inches for
each additional 50 persons to be accommodated thereby. The stair
treads shall be not less than nine and one-half (9½) inches
wide, and the risers not more than seven and three-quarters
(7¾) inches high.
(e) Each school, hospital and theater, over one story high shall
have stairways constructed entirely of incombustible material,
and continuous from grade lines to the topmost story, provided
that this shall not apply for buildings used primarily for Sunday
School purposes without the congested fire limits.
(f) All exit doors in schools, hospitals, theaters, and other
places of public assemblage, shall open outward and all existing
structures of this class shall conform thereto.
(g) All stairways, fire escapes, elevator shafts, and similar
appurtenances which may hereafter be constructed which are
used or designed to be used in whole or in part, by the tenants
of any residential building or property within the A District as
defined by the Building Zone Map, as a regular or supplementary
means of ingress or egress; except as an additional means of
egress during a conflagration, flood, panic or other disaster; shall
be wholly and entirely inclosed within the walls of the building.
This does not apply to entrances on the rear of buildings.
