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Course Information
Department of Architecture, Cornell University


ARCH 4605/6605 Advanced Fire- and Life-Safety Concepts

Fall 2021

Jonathan Ochshorn

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Room: Rand 304; Time: Mondays and Wednesdays 1:00 pm – 2:15 pm

Course Information

Course outline (with assignments)

Course online reading links

Course description, grading, and requirements (pdf)

Rationale: Safety is a fundamental requirement of buildings, yet it is not always prioritized in the design process. Many architects resist implementing fire- and life-safety measures, even when such measures are required by codes, fearing that doing so will compromise their "design ideas." The following quote from a representative for the architect-of-record for the Mui Ho Fine Arts Library at Cornell, while scary, is not atypical: "…we wouldn't be able to do a lot of things that brought up design ideas that are done today, if you strictly interpret the Code the way it was intended."

Course Aims and Objectives: The goal of this course is to provide students with a more advanced understanding of fire- and life-safety provisions in building codes.

My online essays: see Selected writings

Links to student health and wellbeing information: Go to "Personal," then "Health & Wellbeing"