BEACHCOMBER HOTEL

Issue: Vertical accessibility to the guest rooms on the first floor.

Analysis: The applicant is requesting a waiver from providing vertical accessibility to the 12 guest rooms on the first/ground floor of a 29 room two story hotel. The building is deemed historically significant and is within the City of Miami Beach’s Art Deco District. The project will cost $348,000 and includes replacing toilet fixtures and installation of new ceramic flooring and drywall. Four of the rooms will be slightly reconfigured. There are no accessible rooms on the first floor, and the alteration work will provide two fully accessible rooms and one for the hearing impaired with communications features; however, Table 224.4 requires that four rooms be designated for the hearing impaired. A new lift will also be installed from street level to the lobby area. The applicant investigated also adding a lift to the first floor, but the existing corridor and stairs are not wide enough to provide a clear egress when the lift would be engaged. Enlarging the corridor would destroy a large portion of the terrazzo floor which is a critical element in the hotel’s historic designation.

Project Progress:

The project is in plan review.

Items to be Waived:

Vertical accessibility to all levels, as required by Section 553.509, Florida Statutes.

553.509 Vertical accessibility. Nothing in Sections 553.501-553.513 or the guidelines shall be construed to relieve the owner of any building, structure or facility governed by those sections from the duty to provide vertical accessibility to all levels above and below the occupiable grade level regardless of whether the guidelines require an elevator to be installed in such building, structure or facility, except for:

(1) Elevator pits, elevator penthouses, mechanical rooms, piping or equipment catwalks and automobile lubrication and maintenance pits and platforms;

(2) Unoccupiable spaces, such as rooms, enclosed spaces and storage spaces that are not designed for human occupancy, for public accommodations or for work areas; and

(3) Occupiable spaces and rooms that are not open to the public and that house no more than five persons, including, but not limited to equipment control rooms and projection booths.

Waiver Criteria:

The applicant must demonstrate that it would constitute unnecessary, unreasonable or extreme hardship to fully comply with the code.