Deck Steps and Some of the Rules for Spacing and Sizing – Part I

Essential Rules for Spacing and Sizing Deck Steps

Recently, we looked at a beautiful deck, outside of Washington DC, where building codes and rules are different.   We’re going to look at several different facets and aspects of this particular deck to draw comparisons to the modern building code in Washington DC and show examples of why that building code is helpful from a safety perspective. We will also show several photos and examples of places where people often skip requirements of the building code either because they’re unaware of the rules and or because the regular municipal inspectors do not check things fully or properly.

We generally assume that every building inspector has terrific intentions and means to check things very thoroughly. The reality though is that because inspectors often do not have the time at their disposal or the training to know the difference, its difficult for them to be thorough.  (This is one of the really important reasons why it’s good to have a contractor who cares about doing things right.)

By and large, it’s interesting though, that even when these rules are not followed, the overall deck can still function in a pragmatic sort of way and still look very nice. All of the proper construction elements don’t actually bolster or improve the aesthetics very much. It’s oddly counterintuitive. You would think that a deck built right would just look better, but like many things in dirty house flipping and bad construction, sometimes a building or a house can really shine and deceive from an aesthetic perspective.

Visually, things can look great, but meanwhile just beyond the surface, it might be built very badly. One of the biggest problems, here in our DC market today is simply the real estate industry and house flippers, pushing to reduce costs, increase speed, and sell for more and more.  Obviously it doesn’t mean that they’re bad people, it’s just the nature of the market, it incentivizes sweeping important details under the rug, across the board, sadly. It leads shortcuts which lead to problems.

 Deck Steps and Some of the Rules for Spacing and Sizing - Part I

This week, here today, and in the following week, we’ll look at the pictures of the deck shown above.  In the upcoming and following pictures of this particular deck, we show a beautifully well-stained and beautiful deck, full of building code problems, if our code were to apply.  Some of these code problems include the guardrail, the handrail, stair risers, tread depth, framing methodologies, stringer spacing, and overall and configuration and spacing.

According to the 2018 International Residential Code (IRC), which is typically adopted by Washington DC, open risers are permitted on stairs leading to decks, with a specific requirement: no opening between treads can allow the passage of a 4-inch diameter sphere. This means some “openness” is allowed, but large gaps that could pose a safety risk are prohibited.

The building codes are a little bit different in almost every area. Unlike some locations where the entire country or the entire state adopts a particular building code, here these decisions are made by individual municipalities. Washington DC, for example, basically has an entire code that applies throughout just the little city of Washington DC.  Even here though, there are some limited variations depending on the neighborhood, mostly regarding the boundaries of stipulated historic requirements.

Here, even though the building code allows for open risers, it doesn’t allow for spaces in those risers to be greater than 4 in of open space.  The International Residential Code (IRC) is rewritten or updated every 3 years. However DC, historically, has waited several more years to adopt the most recent changes. It’s tough to remember now, but way back in the early 2010’s, DC was actually still mostly using the 2003 published building code.  And then the adoption of the 2009 code didn’t even go into effect until 2012, but enforcement and dissemination of that info took even much longer. 

The staining work on the stairway shown below looks okay, but it has several problems from a structural perspective and from a code compliance perspective. Firstly, not all the treads rest on top of the stringers.

The treads are the elements that you step on when you walk up a set of steps. The stringers are the supporting elements that run perpendicular to the treads.

Risers are the vertical elements which enclose the walking path of the stairway, but here there are no risers at all. The stringers are set too far apart. Here in Washington, DC, the building code generally requires that stringers are set no more than 36” apart. Here, the stringers are built too far apart. We’ll pick up talking about this in this coming week’s article.

well-stained and beautiful deck

In this coming week, we’ll follow up and get even deeper into the details of the building code requirements for deck stair construction.

Use a contractor who understands and cares about doing things right.  Always, feel free to reach out to us here at Dupont Decks and Patios. We are happy to help with almost all steps of the deck building and design process. Let us know about your ideas and talk to us if you have questions about possibilities . You can call us at (202) 774-9128.  You can find us online at https://dupontdeckspatiosdc.com and you can email us there as well at https://dupontdeckspatiosdc.com

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