Some exciting improvements and developments at the Building Department have been published in the past few weeks including the guidelines for adaptive reuse projects converting downtown commercial offices into multi-family residential buildings and a streamlined ADU review process. See below for the direct updates from San Francisco Department of Building Inspection.
Converting Downtown Commercial Offices into Multi-Family Residential
Multiple agencies came together to work on final guidelines for commercial to residential adaptive re-use projects and the result is a thoughtful and comprehensive clarification of building code provisions and local equivalency processes that may present developers and design professionals options which could enable many more potential projects to pencil out without sacrificing code compliance.
Throughout this incredibly extensive information sheet, the authors did a great job of providing clear and detailed information on how to approach equivalencies for building envelope, exterior walls and openings, means of egress, ventilation, lighting, unit size, earthquake safety, accessibility, high-rise and low-rise structures, use of the California Historic Building Code, and the San Franciscos Green building code. Some of the highlights include the following:
- Dwelling unit sizes may meet the minimum size for new construction instead of the larger dimensions required for existing buildings. This will require approval of local equivalency through the SFDBI Administrative Bulletin AB-005 process.
- Qualified historic buildings are permitted to use existing fire escapes per CHBC 8-502.5 where the fire escapes are inspected and improved to comply with SFDBI Administrative Bulletin AB-019.
- Existing elevators in low-rise buildings can remain unchanged in a downtown adaptive reuse project and do not need to be upgraded to meet the current code requirements for gurney size, hoistway construction or Firefighters Emergency Operation.
- High-rise structures over 120’ that do not have fire safe access elevators or do not house two elevator banks, and a hardship to install a new fire safe access elevator exists, may propose alternative equivalent facilitations to satisfy CBC 3003 FSAE.
- Link to full Information Sheet G-29.
ADU Roundtable
The City has also recently launched a new service to streamline and speed up the review and issuance of Accessory Dwelling Unit (ADU) building permits submitted through the State or Hybrid Program.
The Permit Review Roundtable will quickly and efficiently review plans, provide feedback and answer compliance questions during a live virtual meeting. A 45-minute roundtable meeting will be held on Mondays with the ADU project’s design professional, the Department of Building Inspection (DBI), the Planning Department, SF Fire, Public Works and the Public Utilities Commission. Both the adaptive re-use guidelines and the relaunch of the ADU round table process are continued evidence of the hard work behind the scenes by City staff to improve their partnership with the development community.
Authored by Reuben, Junius & Rose, LLP Manager, Post Entitlement Division Gillian Allen.
The issues discussed in this update are not intended to be legal advice and no attorney-client relationship is established with the recipient. Readers should consult with legal counsel before relying on any of the information contained herein. Reuben, Junius & Rose, LLP is a full service real estate law firm. We specialize in land use, development and entitlement law. We also provide a wide range of transactional services, including leasing, acquisitions and sales, formation of limited liability companies and other entities, lending/workout assistance, subdivision and condominium work.
