It’s both a hazard for emergencies as well as a hygienic nightmare. We all see the people leaving without washing their hands!
Primary traffic routes during an emergency have priority. It is a hazard for doors to open into a hallway.
Inner doors should swing inward because in case of a fire or other emergency, you don’t want to be trapped inside by something blocking the door that you cannot deal with. Even in something were preventing it from swinging open (like a rope or whatever), in theory the person could still get out because the door hinge would be located on their side and they could simply remove it.
Also because the hinge would have to be on the outside if swinging outward and thus not be securable. As the hung pins could be removed and door opened while locked.
In large building some code requires exterior doors to swing out as pressure build on a fire could jam the door closed. Also some exits require push bar which is swing out.
The in swing though makes sense for more smaller buildings and internal doors. Not wacking people and not getting blocked in seems the better method.
We have outwards opening bathroom doors in the office and they’re great for giving people concussions and bumps on their head, as well as knocking coffees out of people’s hands. When we pass these doors in the hallway we put our hands up like our abusive dad went for a high five.
TBH I want to know where they were when this building was built. Who came up with this and who allowed it?
if its an older building it may have been built before those laws and then grandfathered in (which is bullshit)
OP you clearly have no clue what you are talking about. Safety if number one reason, slamming the open-door in people walking outside the door is another. You can defend against someone forcing their way in, by using your body weight against door, something you can not do if it swings outward. Odor control is another issue, door swing outward will release the smell into next room, rather than contain it with the swing inward. Finally, this has nothing to do with architects or interior designer, this is a building code bylaw, as accessibility demand the door swing inward for people in a wheelchair so they can operate it.
slamming the open-door in people walking outside the door is another.
That might be true in a small shop, but in a lot of places the bathrooms are recessed into a hallway where nobody who isn’t trying to get into or leave the bathroom should be standing.
You can defend against someone forcing their way in, by using your body weight against door, something you can not do if it swings outward.
Is that really a concern…? The amount of conditions that have to be true for this to become a thing seems really long… boarding on the “your insurance policy covers you if an elephant falls through the roof on the first day of February” cartoon levels of specificity.
Not to mention if you assume a truck stop instead of a restaurant. It might be harder to use your body weight to keep a door closed, but with a proper door frame, deadbolt, and security hinges, it would be basically impossible for some hypothetical attacker to break down the door.
Odor control is another issue, door swing outward will release the smell into next room, rather than contain it with the swing inward.
Um, no it won’t? This is actually backwards the pivot of a door that swings back into a room, will force air out of a room with it swings out. If it swings out, when it closes it’s going to push air back towards the room.
In either case, I’d expect basically no observable impact on the amount of perceivable smell.
accessibility demand the door swing inward for people in a wheelchair so they can operate it.
They still have to get out…? It’s not our handicapped folks are getting stuck in bathrooms are they? And if they are, wouldn’t that be a reason to change this?
this is a building code bylaw,
I’m struggling with the rational
I’m struggling with the rational
Fire codes. There’s laws about this. You can’t have doors swinging into a walkway whether it’s a bathroom door or office door.
That surely doesn’t apply to the situations I discussed above where the bathrooms are recessed (and/or just generally wouldn’t be blocking anything if the door was open).
I’m not an expert (at all), but I presume that opening a door into a thoroughfare risks hitting someone with the door but opening into a room only risks a person ready to leave (and approaching the door head on?)
Just thoughts…
One compromise might be touchless door handles
I’ve also seen these at my school, but it doesn’t work for all doors since the door needs to be light enough
Neither of these are that accessible though, and I can’t find photos of the better ones
accessibility shouldn’t prevent improvements, we can just add the foot handles and handicapped people simply keep operating doors like they currently do.
They’ll still be exposed to fewer germs so they benefit anyways.
The arm one is dumb because I’ve seen people with unwashed hands grab it. The foot one makes more sense. Although it’s not accessible like you said.
The arm one is dumb because I’ve seen people with unwashed hands grab it
So? If I can manipulate it with my sleeved arm (thus keeping my hands clean), it’s still working pretty well. Sure, I’d prefer not to have my sleeve contact something that someone’s unwashed hands have been on, but better that than my hand.
