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This topic comprises 2 pages: 1 2
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Author
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Topic: Door knob ban
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Frank Cox
Film God
Posts: 2234
From: Melville Saskatchewan Canada
Registered: Apr 2011
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posted 11-19-2013 08:23 PM
Vancouver bans doorknobs as move toward accessibility
quote:
Doorknobs in Vancouver will eventually be as dead as a, well, doorknob after the city’s legislature approved a ban on knobs in newly constructed buildings as of March in a move towards accessibility.
Instead of doorknobs, Vancouverites will see levers on doors and sinks of new buildings after the Vancouver City Council voted in September to amend its building code; existing structures are grandfathered into the new regulations. Vancouver is the only one in Canada with its own building code, according to the Vancouver Sun.
The future of the doorknob may be bleak in Vancouver, but Allen Joslyn, president of the Antique Door Knob Collectors of America, thinks the round handle industry will keep on turning. But Joslyn told the Sun that he thinks Vancouver’s doorknob ban is excessive.
“I can understand if you have a public building where everybody wants to have free access and that is a problem,” he told the paper. “But to say that when I build my private home and nobody is disabled that I have to put levers on, strikes me as overreach.”
While the lever handles can’t be switched in public buildings, homeowners who buy new construction will be able to replace the levers for doorknobs. Will Johnston, a former Vancouver building inspector who helped write the new building code, doesn’t see the doorknob totally disappearing from the city. But he also won’t be disappointed if the doorknob goes away.
“We keep talking about the doorknob. Go into Home Depot and look at how many lever door handles there are. There are lots because that is the trend,” he told the Sun. ““Technology changes. Things change. We live with that. … When I look at what we are proposing, it is simply good design. It allows for homes to be built that can be used more easily for everybody.”
The doorknob ban is a move that will help the elderly, the arthritic, and the disabled, who may have difficulty turning a round handle. Vancouver’s new building code represents a change in philosophy known as universal design, where buildings are already outfitted to be convenient for such groups instead of designs that benefit larger portions of society.
“Basically, the idea is that you try to make environments that are as universally usable by any part of the population,” Tim Stainton, a professor and director of the School of Social Work at the University of B.C., told the Sun. “The old model was adaptation, or adapted design. You took a space and you adapted for use of the person with a disability. What universal design says is let’s turn it around and let’s just build everything so it is as usable by the largest segments of the population as possible.”
There are already examples of universal design, Stainton said.
“A really simple version is the cut curbs on every corner. That helps elderly people, people with visual impairments, moms with strollers. It makes a sidewalk that could otherwise be difficult for parts of the population universally accessible,” he said.
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Leo Enticknap
Film God
Posts: 7474
From: Loma Linda, CA
Registered: Jul 2000
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posted 11-20-2013 12:12 PM
How far you regulate and legislate about what people are allowed to do in their own homes is a difficult issue, IMHO. You're trying to balance two, incompatible ideals: keeping the government out of our lives as much as possible, while also saving us from the consequences of our own mistakes, negligence etc. Where do you draw the line?
My main problem with these regs is that when they change, and new ones are brought in, a lot of people become inadvertent law-breakers, and/or are faced with a big bill. I notice that the door level reg in Vancouver is to be "grandfathered in" to existing public buildings. How many small, independent theaters, mom-and-pop stores, etc. are now going to face having to shell out several hundred to replace all their door knobs? OK, one new regulation in itself probably isn't going to drive anyone out of business, but the overall, cumulative effect of them is another story.
Example: I recently read in the instruction manual for a new food blender that the National Electrical Code dictates that all kitchen outlets have to be GFCI-protected (that's RCD for the Brits among us!). None of ours were. After some further looking online, I discovered that this rule was introduced in 1987. Our house was built in 1984, hence no GFCIs. I also discovered that if a kitchen fire had started as the result of an electrical fault, our insurance probably wouldn't have paid up, because the electrical installation didn't meet the code.
So I went around the house replacing all the necessary outlets with GFCI ones, and that job is now done. The total cost was around $100 and a few hours of my time. In itself, that's not a big deal. But I'd guess that probably most of the houses in this development probably still have unprotected kitchen outlets. The cost of converting all of them - five figures, I'd guess. Multiply that by all the houses nationwide that would need to have GFCIs installed to meet code - millions.
I'm not suggesting that there should be no regulation at all, and that everyone should be allowed to connect their 2KW tumble dryer with bellwire, but there is a real cost to all these rules 'n regs, which I suspect often isn't weighed up objectively against the safety risks they're designed to reduce.
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Mike Blakesley
Film God
Posts: 12767
From: Forsyth, Montana
Registered: Jun 99
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posted 11-20-2013 12:27 PM
I have gotten to love the lever door handles. At first I thought they were "ok" based just on the looks of them, but had no preference...but, I have opened doors with my knees, elbows, rear end, foot, wrist, a broom handle, etc. and could probably accomplish it with a few other body parts. The other slight advantage is you don't have to grip a slippery ice-cold doorknob in the winter with your hand, you can just push down with your gloves on.
Should it be legislated in new home construction? I don't think so. If a handicapped person who required levers was to move into a non-equipped house, it would be a simple matter to change the hardware.
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