Fewer staircases in new LA buildings? Why experts say it could unlock more housing

A new Los Angeles City Council proposal envisions a future in which renters live in buildings with less room for stairs and more room for apartments.

The motion introduced Wednesday could lead to eliminating parts of the local building code that currently require mid-sized apartment buildings to include more than one staircase.

Councilmember Nithya Raman, chair of the council’s Housing Committee and a co-author of the new motion, said this seemingly small change has potential to greatly increase the amount and variety of apartments getting built in a city starved for affordable housing options.

“I see this as part of a larger effort for me to push the city to do more to make it easier to build housing,” Raman told LAist.

She said single-staircase blueprints could give developers more physical space for each new apartment. Only 14% of the city’s existing rental housing units have three bedrooms or more, leaving young parents who can’t afford L.A.’s single-family houses with few family-sized options.

“A big part of why people end up leaving Los Angeles right now is because their family grows and they're unable to find a home at their price point,” Raman said. “If we had more rental stock that had two or three bedrooms rather than just one bedroom, I think that could also encourage people to stay in Los Angeles. I'd really like to make that possible.”

Why you’re likely to hear more about single-staircase policy

Calls for single-staircase reform have been percolating in a handful of cities across the country in recent years. Local governments in San Francisco and Austin, Texas are weighing changes to their building codes that could permit single-staircase designs.

Housing policy experts note that apartments built around a single staircase are the norm outside the U.S., and are commonly found throughout Europe and Asia. Today New York, Seattle and Honolulu are the only U.S. cities that allow single-staircase plans in buildings between four and six stories tall.

During the 20th Century, most cities in the United States adopted requirements for multiple staircases in buildings more than three stories tall. The standards were created to give residents multiple ways out of a building in the case of a fire.

The problem, housing advocates say, is that these double-staircase mandates leave less physical space for an apartment building’s primary job: providing housing. Long hallways connecting the two staircases push apartments to the sides of buildings, leaving many units with windows along just one wall and cutting off space that could have been used for additional bedrooms.

Research finds low risk, cheaper construction costs

Updated safety features such as sprinklers and fire-resistant building materials have made staircases less crucial for tenant safety, housing advocates say.

“Research has been showing that [single-staircase buildings] are just as safe as double-stair designs, they are more affordable than other types of apartments, and they fit on more lots," Muhammad Alameldin, a policy associate with UC Berkeley’s Terner Center for Housing Innovation, told LAist.

A study published last month by the Pew Charitable Trusts found that the rate of fire deaths in New York City between 2012 and 2024 was no different in modern single-staircase buildings as in other residential buildings.

The Pew study also found total construction costs for four-to-six story buildings on small lots typically increase by 6% to 13% when a second staircase is required. Alameldin said this helps explain why developers building new housing in cities like L.A. tend to propose larger projects, rather than mid-sized apartment buildings.

“The double-stair requirement forces developers to build much more units and make much bigger buildings than they would if there was just a single stair requirement,” Alameldin said.

Next steps for L.A.’s single-staircase proposal

The L.A. City Council motion is in early stages. It still needs to be scheduled for votes in committee and in the full council. If approved, the motion would instruct the city’s Building and Safety department, the Planning Department and the Fire Department to report within 90 days on building code modifications to allow single-staircases in residential buildings up to six stories.

Raman said that with this motion and others — like her recent proposal to permit small housing projects through a self-certification process — she hopes to spur new housing construction from developers who’ve viewed building in L.A. as too expensive and cumbersome.

“There's no way that we will be able to build our way out of this using public funds alone,” she said. “We have to do more to encourage private development. ... We want to push them to be building the kinds of things we need, like family-sized apartments.”

Meanwhile, state legislators are also considering single-staircase reforms. California lawmakers passed Assembly Bill 835 in 2023, a law requiring the state fire marshal to study and present potential plans for single-staircase designs in buildings taller than three stories by Jan. 1, 2026.