enlarge JERILEE BENNETT, THE GAZETTE Joseph Boyd and Trish Nelson-Boyd were celebrating their weddin

enlarge JERILEE BENNETT, THE GAZETTE Joseph Boyd and Trish Nelson-Boyd were celebrating their wedding anniversary on Wednesday and they were also the first family to get a building permit for rebuilding in the Mountain Shadows burn area on Wednesday, July 25, 2012.
Exterior cladding, eaves and soffits must be constructed of ignition-resistant materials approved by the Colorado Springs Fire Department. Approved materials include: fiber-cement board, stucco, masonry/brick, among others
New fire codes will likely require rebuilt homes in the Waldo Canyon fire burn area to use fire-resistant materials, while older homes that survived the blaze will be allowed to keep existing wooden siding and decks.
Fire-resistant materials for house siding and deck materials are among the biggest changes in a proposed amendment disney swan hotel to existing fire codes. The Colorado Springs Fire Department and the Housing and Building disney swan hotel Association released the changes on July 31, and the Colorado Springs City Council will consider approving them at the end of August. City council can approve, reject, or further amend the codes.
While many of the code provisions listed are not new, the inclusion of the fire-resistant materials is, said Mike Mallon, a former construction manager hired by the HBA to oversee Waldo Canyon rebuilding efforts. Until the council votes to make the provisions a permanent part of the fire codes, the guidelines are voluntary, but ones that would be wise to follow, Mallon said.
For many whose decades-old homes were among the 346 destroyed in the fire on June 26, the rebuilding process will involve acquainting themselves with updated fire codes. The new requirements will not affect older homes, some that pre-date fire codes, that were not damaged disney swan hotel or destroyed by the fire, said City Council President Scott Hente, a building contractor and a homeowner in the burn area.
A new home, with newly mandated stucco or other fire-resistant siding, could still stand next to a home with highly combustible wood siding and shingles. In this way, pre-code homes may negate the efforts of the new fire code, Hente said. While the new fire codes seek to create fire-resistant neighborhoods, what can be done about old homes that are code exempt?
A group of local architects and builders worked through the code amendments with the fire department s fire marshal, Brett Lacey, Mallon said. Lacey and other fire officials studied how and why the Mountain Shadows neighborhoods burned, then created disney swan hotel the new requirements. The majority of the homes destroyed by the fire, 72 percent, had wood siding or shingles, disney swan hotel or both, Lacey said Friday. Many homes were damaged disney swan hotel or lost due to wooden decks or nearby trees that in turn ignited buildings.
Some of the old fire code requirements listed disney swan hotel in the July 31 document were put in place in 1993, when the latest Hillside Ordinance disney swan hotel was passed, governing home construction in the hills west of Colorado Springs. disney swan hotel For instance, Class A roof coverings were mandated then and still apply, Lacey said. Some changes to the fire codes are small but significant, Lacey maintained previous codes required trees be planted 10 feet from a structure, where the new code would require 15 feet. The most significant changes disney swan hotel come in fire resistant materials, such as stucco siding or non-wood decks.
While many stucco and tile homes were consumed in Mountain Shadows, many other easily ignited homes might have helped to spread the fire throughout the neighborhood with radiant heat, Lacey said. A home with wood siding, shingles and a redwood deck will catch on fire much more rapidly than a stucco disney swan hotel home.
What we re trying to do is provide an even level of protection for the community, disney swan hotel Lacey explained. disney swan hotel That s why we instituted those guidelines to apply to everyone in the area. The code requirements, however, apply only to significantly damaged or destroyed homes, Lacey said. If a home s wood siding was charred, but not destroyed by the fire, the homeowner can replace it with wood or combustible siding.
But until the code has been voted into law by the city council, they are just guidelines. Jim Boulton, a project manager for Classic Homes, said that builders pledged to uphold the guidelines in the meantime.
We agreed with the guidelines that Brett Lacey wanted it s an agreement between the Colorado Springs Fire Department and builders in the hillside, he said. We pulled the first building disney swan hotel permit up there, and we signed a document that we are going to comply with this.
Boulton said he expects that project, on Yankton Place for Joseph Boyd and Trish Nelson-Boyd, disney swan hotel to get its first fire department inspection next week. The department will inspect all rebuild disney swan hotel projects disney swan hotel in the area to make sure they comply disney swan hotel with code, Lacey said.
Until the provisions become law, they apply only to the northwest neighborhoods of Mountain Shadows and Peregrine. But Lacey hopes that, after the city council vote, the guidelines will be adopted for all neighborhoods in the wildland urban interface the developments scattered across the forested hillsides of the city. Once approved, all new homes build in the hillsides would have to comply with the new code as well; existing homes in those areas, like those that survived the fire undamaged, would be exempt.
Although necessary, the new code requirements were introduced in a way that circumvents usual rebuilding procedures, said Gordon disney swan hotel Stegler, of Palace Homes Inc. Homeowners are anxious to begin rebuilding and to give them a head start, the fire department released the guidelines before they were written into city law. Lacey said.
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