Improved Fire Egress -- Pasadena Style
Before:
After:
For those who missed the key detail about what changed, here's what the door to the outside in the kitchen looks like now:
Now, in the interest of full disclosure, I was not actually present at the city inspection, so I'm relying on the word of my contractor who said the reason the city insisted that the side overhang be removed was because it blocked legal fire egress. The washer and dryer hookups were on that side of the house, and it's illegal to have a washer and dryer in an uncovered exterior location, so they also had to come out. And that means they needed to be relocated inside, and the only place they could realistically go was where the door to the outside had been.
So, yes, we improved fire egress by removing an exterior door.
No, it doesn't matter that the only place in the house that the side yard is fire egress for is the kitchen, which previously had a door that wasn't under the overhang and now just has a small window.
No, it doesn't matter that the overhang was there when I bought the house (and when the previous owners bought the house), and that none of the neighbors objected to it staying.
That's Pasadena for you.
After:
For those who missed the key detail about what changed, here's what the door to the outside in the kitchen looks like now:
Now, in the interest of full disclosure, I was not actually present at the city inspection, so I'm relying on the word of my contractor who said the reason the city insisted that the side overhang be removed was because it blocked legal fire egress. The washer and dryer hookups were on that side of the house, and it's illegal to have a washer and dryer in an uncovered exterior location, so they also had to come out. And that means they needed to be relocated inside, and the only place they could realistically go was where the door to the outside had been.
So, yes, we improved fire egress by removing an exterior door.
No, it doesn't matter that the only place in the house that the side yard is fire egress for is the kitchen, which previously had a door that wasn't under the overhang and now just has a small window.
No, it doesn't matter that the overhang was there when I bought the house (and when the previous owners bought the house), and that none of the neighbors objected to it staying.
That's Pasadena for you.