I am in Virginia, designing a house to be built outside of Colorado Springs for a couple who live in Texas and I need a question answered asap. The second floor living space is tucked under the roof. Is there a minimum stemwall height required? I have space to meet the 50% minimum of sloped room ceiling above 7’6″, and the bedrooms currently are designed to have minimum height at 5’6″. The clients want to know if I can move the walls out so minimum height is 4’6″ – they plan to have built-in bookcases added sometime in the future. The roof slope is 9/12 so doing this would buy a nice bit of extra square footage. Is this doable?
Annie F.
Wake, Virginia
Edited 2/9/2007 4:10 pm ET by ragtaghorde
Replies
I am assuming you mean 'kneewalls' as opposed to stemwalls.
The 2003 IRC states:
"Not more than 50% of the required floor area of a room or space is permitted to have a sloped ceiling less than 7 feet in height with no portion of the required floor area less than 5 feet in height"
You need to contact the agency having jurasdiction to see what code they are enforcing.
_______________________________________________________________
'That's all I've got to say about that' - Forrest Gump
"Kneewalls! Kneewalls! Of course!" Smacking self upside the head...Annie F.
'Sides, if I recall correctly, there is an indefinate moratorium on allowing Texans into Colorado.
:-+)_______________________________________________________________
'That's all I've got to say about that' - Forrest Gump
when did I move to the SW United States???Life is not a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming<!----><!----><!---->
WOW!!! What a Ride!Forget the primal scream, just ROAR!!!
That's just to throw 'em off the trail....._______________________________________________________________
'That's all I've got to say about that' - Forrest Gump
I can go with that...Life is not a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming<!----><!----><!---->
WOW!!! What a Ride!Forget the primal scream, just ROAR!!!
You're never below timberline anymore anyway._______________________________________________________________
'That's all I've got to say about that' - Forrest Gump
The land is in El Paso County. The Texans are really economic exiles from Colorado returning home after looting TX, so it's OK for them to move in - like Jews to the Holy Land, or the right to Irish citizenship as long as at least one grandparent was born in Ireland...Annie
El Paso County has adopted most of the 2003 IRC, so the aformentioned code call should apply.
I suppose we could 'grandfather' the expatriates back in._______________________________________________________________
'That's all I've got to say about that' - Forrest Gump
If both grandparents were born in Ireland does that confer dual citizenship? ;-)
which county???
Life is not a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming
WOW!!! What a Ride!
Forget the primal scream, just ROAR!!!
Never seen such a State, with different codes and different jurasdictions, can't we all just get along?
Canon thinking about adopting the 2006 I codes....County still using 2000, I think. Two codes, right across the street from each other.'
At least in NM, we all spoke the same lingo -
Broken english._______________________________________________________________
'That's all I've got to say about that' - Forrest Gump
I know...
should have asked for a street addy...Life is not a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming<!----><!----><!---->
WOW!!! What a Ride!Forget the primal scream, just ROAR!!!
What about building the kneewalls at 4'6". Then building an additional wall at 5'6". thus when and if they do want to do the buildins it would be realatively easy to make remove it and add the builtins.
.
A-holes. Hey every group has to have one. And I have been elected to be the one. I should make that my tagline.
Not from Co., but may have a helpful hint.
It may be if you move the walls out you still have the minimum 50% space to meet the requirement.
What I am trying to say is that our code didn't count any floor sq.ft. that was under the 5' miminum hgt. as counting towards the rooms 50% sq.ft. requirement.
"...not less than 7'6" for at least 50% of their required area"
" No portion of the REQUIRED areas less than 5' "
"Portions of the room having less than 5' .....shall not be considered as contributing to the minimum required habitable area for that room."
Another way to look at it what happens if you use no knee walls, code only counts that floor area that falls inside the 5' prescribed minmum hgt. as contributing to the 50% rule.
Hope I am making sense here....
Edited 2/11/2007 2:30 am ET by dovetail97128
dovetail, you are making *perfect* sense! If they don't count the space under 5' as habitable then we will be good to go. I suppose the Building Inspector will let us know if I am wrong :^)Annie
gotta love a good plan review.. saves the actual construction from a redo.
BINGO...you've got it. Your reward is on it's way!