Occupant load

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May 21, 2020 18:41

Do you always round up when you calculate occupant load?

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  David Kaplan May 21, 2020 20:50

  Let me answer this this way to avoid a back and forth on the forum about how different jurisdictions approach this in real life practice: for the purposes of the ARE, if you're asked to do this on the exam, the test will tell you if you should round up or not, and if so, to how many decimal places.

  Period.  You don't need to know anything else other than that.

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  Nicholas Hubof May 21, 2020 21:15

  In my local jurisdictions (Washington and Idaho) we always round up!

  The theory behind that, is that you can't have a fraction of a human being. 3.1 occupants, would be rounded up to 4 occupants. 

  Good luck!

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  AlyssaBaz June 04, 2020 05:49

  I've heard that it depends on what you're calculating: If it's the allowed occupants for a space such that will be posted in an Assembly area, it is not rounded up, but down to the nearest whole integer. If it's for the egress fire and life safety plan and has to do with the number of people collected in an exit access for example, then decimals are fine for calculating widths of corridors, required numbers of exits, etc. 

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  Beau Tanner May 09, 2022 22:17

  I know that I'm a little late to this conversation, but refer to IBC Section 1004.5: "For areas without fixed seating, the occupant load shall be not less than that number..."  In other words, round up for occupant load.

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