Second staircases are touted as a panacea for building safety, but the reality is far more complex

Navigating the labyrinth of building safety regulations can feel overwhelming, often leading to a quest for quick-fix solutions. Consider, for instance, the idea that adding a second staircase, as recently announced by The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities in the latest revisions to Approved Document B, “guarantees” safety. It’s a tempting short-term fix, but does it truly address the deeper structural complexities?

While documents like Approved Document B serve a purpose, they’re not a panacea for the industry’s challenges. These guidelines provide reasonable minimum requirements and standards, but are not the end-all when it comes to building safety.

Do we need second staircases in high-rise residential buildings?

The question has haunted the industry following the Grenfell Tower fire in 2017. Yet, seven years later, building safety concerns persist.

Dame Judith Hackitt’s review of building safety pinpointed systemic failures stemming from ignorance, lack of competence, and inadequate oversight, calling for a fundamental transformation of the regulatory framework, emphasising an outcome-based approach over mere ‘compliance’.

As we review yet another version of Approved Document B, it can be argued that the guidelines have deviated from Hackitt’s report.

In the event of a fire, does the addition of a staircase alone guarantee safety for tenants? From a fire safety engineering first principles perspective, the answer is “no”, as building safety isn’t a tick-box exercise.

The risk with documents such as Approved Document B becoming overly specific and prescriptive, is they can provide systemic routes to the presumption of safety. While redundancy in means of escape is a good thing, when we consider the wider systemic issues highlighted by Dame Judith Hackitt, it could allow complacency to set in. During the design process of a building, a second staircase may be added, creating an assumption the building is safe, without too much critical thought into the specifics of the building. It can be argued such complacency is a greater risk to safety than the provision of a single staircase.

Uncertainty over guidelines poses a threat to developments too. In London alone, 38,000 residential projects have been paused due to ongoing uncertainty surrounding the second staircase debate, raising concerns around economic feasibility and market growth.

The question comes naturally – can an architectural element bring the market to a halt? Indeed. Regarding the recently announced updates about the two-stair requirement, the omission of requiring an additional stair core leaves open the potential to exploit the system, allowing less stringent requirements where a second means of escape is genuinely required to achieve a safe building.

It all comes down to competence, which cannot be found in an approved document. The basic dilemma of ‘two staircases good, one staircase bad’ oversimplifies the complex nature of fire safety. There is a danger of becoming laser-focused on guidance rather than the performance requirement which will make the building safe.

Many factors contribute to the safety of a building, including fire protection measures, emergency exits, smoke extraction systems, and more. The safety, or otherwise of a building must be engineered by a competent professional, and the only people who can verify such designs are competent professionals. The Industry Competence Committee and Building Safety Regulator are critical in facilitating an improvement of competence across industry, as highlighted by Dame Judith Hackitt’s recommendations.

Are we mistaking the second staircase guideline as a building code?

Those familiar with Approved Document B will know that specific guidance is not new in the document. While this is not inherently a problem, the further the guidance becomes prescriptive in nature, the more we may be deviating from our performance based regulatory framework. This could also diminish the importance of the fire safety professional and competent peer reviewer, who should be the primary professional in determining the performance of the building with respect to fire safety.

Overly specific guidelines with defined metrics such as number of staircases or travel distances are frequently mistaken as building codes, similar to those that are used across the USA. New York City, for example, operates on strict building codes and zoning regulations to provide for the construction of safe and sustainable buildings throughout the city.

The implementation of metric-specific guidelines prescribed by Approved Document B has led people for decades to believe that the UK operates under a code-based industry, which simply isn’t the case. A building isn’t safe simply because it has two staircases, nor is a building safe just because it meets prescribed travel distance requirements. Relying solely on meeting these metrics is not a fool-proof safeguard against potential hazards and is a dangerous oversimplification. The UK’s approach to building regulations is multifaceted and far from a one-size-fits-all model.

Is a second staircase worth the hole in our pocket?

Recent data has also shown that introducing second staircases to new high-rise developments will cost the industry billions over the next decade.

In the wake of Grenfell, when the government foreshadowed an introduction of a second staircase for buildings 18m and above, there were many fire engineers who warned of a non-evidence-based response which wouldn’t result in a proportional increase in safety. It makes one ponder what cost effective fire safety engineered solutions will be overlooked in place of the provision of a second stair.

Dr James McNay is divisional director of fire safety at Hydrock