Technology in Architectural Practice

This message has been cross posted to the following Discussion Forums: Technology in Architectural Practice and Committee on Design .
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My fellow architects, this information may have been posted before - but I haven't seen it.


Do you want your building codes for free?

How about safety standards such as ASTM, AASHTO, ISO and the like?

 

There is a website that provides these in pdf format for free. Why? Because these codes and standards are public law (or referenced by public law) and they cannot be copyrighted ... legally.

 

Here is the website:  https://law.resource.org/

 

For Building Codes -

Select 12 Tables of Public Safety Codes on the home page,

            Then select Table 01 - Table of Codes,

            Scroll down to near the bottom and select United States (State) for IBC, NEC and the like

 

For ASTM Standards and other public safety standards, follow the same path for Building Codes but select United States (Federal) under the Table of Codes.

 

Good hunting!

 

Feel "free" to pass this information along to your colleagues.

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Steven Cox AIA
President
Cox Architecture
Mccomb MS
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I went to this website and took a look. The codes provided appear to be out of date and not the latest version in use.

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Sarah Lindenfeld AIA
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Try this:

http://publicecodes.cyberregs.com/icod/index.htm



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Benyamin Ber AIA
Owner
Neh•Koo•Dah
Brookline MA
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Original Message:
Sent: 07-23-2013 08:15
From: Sarah Lindenfeld
Subject: Codes and Standards - Free

I went to this website and took a look. The codes provided appear to be out of date and not the latest version in use.

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Sarah Lindenfeld AIA
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not all documents are up to date in this download list. South Carolina is currently recognizing the 2012 IBC edition but this law list is only current to 2006. it may take a while for this site to get up to speed with the latest editions.

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Jeffrey Warren AIA
Architect
DESIGNshop, inc.
Simpsonville SC
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Thank you very much, Steven.
A wonderful starting point but  -  Use with caution.
The link for New Jersey is to an unedited version of the IBC not the edited IBC used in New Jersey.
The NJAC enabling and modifying regs are not included.

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David Ringer AIA
Lambertville NJ
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This might be a good resource to start with, but it should not be relied upon as being the authoritative source.
The site lists the State of Florida as enforcing the 2009 IBC family of codes.  Whereas the current Florida Building code is based upon that code, there are many, many substantive changes and additions to the code that have been adopted.  There are also local amendments that are often adopted.

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Stephen Lafferty
University of South Florida
Tampa FL
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Original Message:
Sent: 07-23-2013 11:22
From: David Ringer
Subject: Codes and Standards - Free

Thank you very much, Steven.
A wonderful starting point but  -  Use with caution.
The link for New Jersey is to an unedited version of the IBC not the edited IBC used in New Jersey.
The NJAC enabling and modifying regs are not included.

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David Ringer AIA
Lambertville NJ
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I use this website for many of the municipal codes. 
Some cities will also include the building codes.

http://www.amlegal.com/library/





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Nguyen Nguyen Assoc. AIA
Designer
Chicago IL
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This is another source for up-to-date free I-Codes. They have several versions back, as well as the latest.
I found it through the ICC website, so it's a legitimate resource.

http://publicecodes.cyberregs.com/icod/

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David Bartley, LEED AP BD+C
Code Analyst
Code Unlimited LLC
Portland, OR
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Thanks, David. Good to get that information out there. It is interesting, though, that they limit the "free" access, and

 "If you are interested in being able to have full search and printing abilities, please visit us at eCodes for a pay option, that will allow full access and full features."

I like being able to download a pdf and search it, print any portion of it, etc.

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Steven Cox AIA
President
Cox Architecture
Mccomb MS
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Original Message:
Sent: 07-24-2013 18:11
From: David Bartley
Subject: Codes and Standards - Free

This is another source for up-to-date free I-Codes. They have several versions back, as well as the latest.
I found it through the ICC website, so it's a legitimate resource.

http://publicecodes.cyberregs.com/icod/

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David Bartley, LEED AP BD+C
Code Analyst
Code Unlimited LLC
Portland, OR
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I have been using the http://publicecodes.cyberregs.com/icod/ link quite a bit lately, and find it very handy, but much less convenient than having a full pdf which is searchable.  I find myself opening multiple tabs in the browser, and sometimes saving screenshots of some of the pages and tables so I can leave them up on one of my monitors as I am researching code issues that require jumping from section to section.

As a sole practitioner in the St. Louis area, I find each municipality and county jurisdiction is different on the various codes that have been adopted, and purchasing an electronic (much less printed) copy of each code would be an undue cost burden at this point.  Thus I am willing to spend a little extra time pulling my resources together as I go, as I need certain parts of certain codes.

I hope Missouri will join other states soon in adopting a set of building codes statewide, to clean up some of this clutter and inefficiency.

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Haden Smith AIA
Haden D. Smith AIA Architect, LLC
St. Louis MO
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Original Message:
Sent: 07-25-2013 17:36
From: Steven Cox
Subject: Codes and Standards - Free

Thanks, David. Good to get that information out there. It is interesting, though, that they limit the "free" access, and

 "If you are interested in being able to have full search and printing abilities, please visit us at eCodes for a pay option, that will allow full access and full features."

I like being able to download a pdf and search it, print any portion of it, etc.

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Steven Cox AIA
President
Cox Architecture
Mccomb MS
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Another very valuable one is http://www.nfpa.org/codes-and-standards/document-information-pages

You have to create a login for their site, but once you do that, you can view the NFPA standards online free. Make sure to use the Table of Contents button to jump to the chapter you need. Otherwise it's painful to move around in their java interface.

Here in Oregon, the state has made their amended versions of the various I-Codes available in one-chapter-per-PDF-File format. It's nice to be able to do text searches throughout a chapter, but they're locked-down from printing or merging. If you haven't already, you can check iccsafe.org for your state's codes and see if there are any freely available for download.

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David Bartley, LEED AP BD+C
Code Analyst
Code Unlimited LLC
Portland, OR
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Original Message:
Sent: 07-25-2013 17:36
From: Steven Cox
Subject: Codes and Standards - Free

Thanks, David. Good to get that information out there. It is interesting, though, that they limit the "free" access, and

 "If you are interested in being able to have full search and printing abilities, please visit us at eCodes for a pay option, that will allow full access and full features."

I like being able to download a pdf and search it, print any portion of it, etc.

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Steven Cox AIA
President
Cox Architecture
Mccomb MS
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I use archive.org.  They have some versions of texts from ICC, NFPA, ANSI and ASTM.  They are not all bookmarked, but as others have said, I tend to use keyword search.  If you go to the home page, be sure to search under Texts>Additional Collections.  I have included some links below:

ICC: http://archive.org/search.php?query=ICC%20AND%20collection%3Aadditional_collections

NFPA:  http://archive.org/search.php?query=NFPA%20AND%20collection%3Aadditional_collections

ANSI:  http://archive.org/search.php?query=ANSI%20AND%20collection%3Aadditional_collections

ASTM:  http://archive.org/search.php?query=ASTM%20AND%20collection%3Aadditional_collections

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Kent Steen AIA
Architect, Associate
Davis Design
Lincoln NE
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Original Message:
Sent: 07-25-2013 17:36
From: Steven Cox
Subject: Codes and Standards - Free

Thanks, David. Good to get that information out there. It is interesting, though, that they limit the "free" access, and

 "If you are interested in being able to have full search and printing abilities, please visit us at eCodes for a pay option, that will allow full access and full features."

I like being able to download a pdf and search it, print any portion of it, etc.

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Steven Cox AIA
President
Cox Architecture
Mccomb MS
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