Multi-use highrise buildings

Multi-use highrise buildings are appearing with increasing frequency and pose interesting decisions for design professionals and regulatory authorities. Assume you are responsible for reviewing the design for such a large building. How would you approach the problem of setting requirements when there are multiple types of occupancies in the same building? The problem is not as simple as requiring fire-rated partitions between the different types of occupancies within the same building. Many of the issues concern human and organizational factors. Especially important is how the occupancies interact regarding exiting requirements. What if a building has an assembly occupancy on it’s second floor. Would you permit the theater patrons to leave using the main building entrance? If you required that most of the patrons leave using exits dedicated to the theater, how would you assure that they would use those exits instead of the main entrance?

Differentiate between performance and prescriptive codes and explain the benefits and drawbacks of each.
Explain industry goals for the future that are informed by behavioral science.
Apply knowledge to create a system that integrates human behavior factors into life safety planning and practice.
Demonstrate synthesis of learning over this course by drawing conclusions based on material studied and applying knowledge to practical and realistic tasks.