Is this staircase toooooo narrow?

ellie27

Following my previous post....

Floorplans... http://media.rightmove.co.uk/60k/59084/27985005/59084_212433_FLP_00_0000_max_600x600.jpg

We want to remove wall between kitchen and dining room and put on doors to garden at the back.

Unfortunately we have staircase to bedrooms in our dining room..... we could reposition the stairs to the hallway, with the bottom step being just infront of the 'C' cupboard. That was were the original staircase was before previous owners converted upstairs from 1 bed to 3 bedroms. Wall to wall that cupboard is 78cm - is this too narrow for a staircase?

Any thoughts, thanks!

EDITED - I am in Scotland and done a bit of googling, obviously, and came across somewhere saying 900mm is minimum....... not sure if thats old building standards or if each council have their own though.

System

It's too narrow, you need 900 wide, if you are putting a new stair in there are a few regs that you need to comply with, likely will not be as steep as your existing stair or as narrow...
Scottish technical standards apply across the board but there's a few things open to interpretation by officers, stairs isn't one of those things unfortunately

leveller2911

the_r_sole wrote: »

It's too narrow, you need 900 wide, if you are putting a new stair in there are a few regs that you need to comply with, likely will not be as steep as your existing stair or as narrow...
Scottish technical standards apply across the board but there's a few things open to interpretation by officers, stairs isn't one of those things unfortunately

In England Believe it or not there is no minimum width for a staircase in a domestic dwelling. Plenty of other regs so minimum going (tread depth) 220mm maximum rise (tread height) of 220mm ,maximum pitch of stairs 42 degrees ,headroom minimum 2m etc etc etc.. Personally I think anything under 800mm overall of strings is too narrow for everyday use.

It is a strange one though..:) EDIT Just read the OP is in Scotland and if they require minimum of 900mm then again thats extreme and too wide in most houses.

ellie27

the_r_sole wrote: »

It's too narrow, you need 900 wide, if you are putting a new stair in there are a few regs that you need to comply with, likely will not be as steep as your existing stair or as narrow...
Scottish technical standards apply across the board but there's a few things open to interpretation by officers, stairs isn't one of those things unfortunately

You seem quite knowledgeable....... CAN I keep my stairs in my open kitchen dining room. Leaving all as is and just knocking down the diving wall? I have done lot of googling and did think I would need some type of sprinkler system and top bedrooms fitted with fire-doors..... any knowledge on this thanks!

System

leveller2911 wrote: »

In England Believe it or not there is no minimum width for a staircase in a domestic dwelling. Plenty of other regs so minimum going (tread depth) 220mm maximum rise (tread height) of 220mm ,maximum pitch of stairs 42 degrees ,headroom minimum 2m etc etc etc.. Personally I think anything under 800mm overall of strings is too narrow for everyday use.

It is a strange one though..:) EDIT Just read the OP is in Scotland and if they require minimum of 900mm then again thats extreme and too wide in most houses.

it's 900mm clear but you can reduce it to 800 clear if you have handrails on both sides... if it was serving a single room you can go down to 600mm but we have much more strict rules for staircases in scotland for whatever reason!

Nilrem

I'm no expert, but most rules only come into effect if there is a change, so for existing things they'd be grandfathered in.

IE if you have a new fuse box it has to meet the latest mandatory standards, but you can still have a 25+ year old on in an existing installation.

With the stairs I'd be surprised if they had to be replaced with ones that meet the modern standards unless they were being replaced anyway.

The problem would likely be the removal of the wall from the kitchen, that would almost certainly require additional fire prevention/protection elsewhere in the house.

System

ellie27 wrote: »

You seem quite knowledgeable....... CAN I keep my stairs in my open kitchen dining room. Leaving all as is and just knocking down the diving wall? I have done lot of googling and did think I would need some type of sprinkler system and top bedrooms fitted with fire-doors..... any knowledge on this thanks!

you are only a bungalow, so as long as your windows up the stairs could be used as a means of escape then it's fine (i.e. cill between 900mm and 1100mm and a reasonable opening area), you should also be able to keep your current stair arrangement without too much hassle, not sure how desirable it would be to have kitchen smells open to a stair?

suki1964

I was under the impression that a fireman wearing full breathing apparatus had to be able to negotiate them which meant 900 wide ?

Or is that just work places?

Just remember our office being closed as the fire brigade wouldn't certify it because of aisle and stair clearence

teddysmum

A staircase is useless if you cannot move suitable furniture up and down it.


My son has a new house and is restricted to a bed with it's mattress on a frame, as a divan cannot be taken up the stairs.

marc81

Sorry to thread hijack, but I have a question of a similar nature. We are about to have work done on the house and to incorporate a new doorway we are having to change the landing slightly which means bringing the top of the stairs in a bit - when you currently get to the top of our stairs before the turn you are faced with a stud wall, this is the side of our airing cupboard which will be removed and a rail/spindles put in to open up the landing, this makes the top stairs narrower at the turn but the steps that will be altered are angled. Does anyone know if it's the maximum depth that will be looked at when taking regs in to account? The pic below should help if i'm not very clear, the dotted red line will be the new width of the stairs.



Thanks,

martindow

Marc - I can't see a plan - did you forget to put it in? I had some work done in the house and one of the stipulations with repositioning a door was that there had to be a minimum distance from the top of the stairs to the doorway.

This is in England - the OP referred to Scottish regs.