That shortage pushes up rents on many existing units, Martin said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cResidential rents (in Chicago) are up 51% over the last 10 years,\u201d he said, while wages grew 37%.\u00a0<\/p>\n
He said the single-staircase initiative and Mayor Brandon Johnson\u2019s \u201cCut the Tape\u201d agenda<\/a> are both ways to clear out regulations that make it hard to build. State legislators and Gov. JB Pritzker are also proposing to allow the construction of single-staircase multifamily buildings, alongside several housing policy proposals<\/a>, but the reforms haven\u2019t made it out of the General Assembly.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ve got a lot of work to do, and to create more affordable housing we need to do a bunch of things simultaneously,\u201d Martin said, but the Fire Department\u2019s opinion carries a lot of weight with the City Council, so passing a single-stair ordinance will take patience.\u00a0<\/p>\n The Congress for the New Urbanism will hold a design competition this year to showcase the technique\u2019s potential. Contestants need to identify a specific Chicago lot, design a building of up to five stories for the site, and explain how their single-staircase plan would serve its neighborhood better than a conventional project.\u00a0<\/p>\n A jury of Chicago architects, developers and urban planners will select winners by late September.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThis is an excellent way to spend the summer and to find the political support we\u2019ll need,\u201d Vance said.\u00a0<\/p>\n Martin said the June 4 hearing was another opportunity to win over opponents.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cSingle-stair buildings are one commonsense strategy, especially considering what other cities and states have done,\u201d Martin said. \u201cChicago is increasingly out of steps with its peers.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n A solution for tight lots<\/p>\n The apartments Chicago housing advocates envision probably look a lot like Seattle\u2019s Juniper Flats. Developed in 2023, the 12-unit complex occupies a narrow lot in Ballard, a forested neighborhood with many single-family homes. It has four units per floor, all connected by a single staircase.<\/p>\n \u201cThese smaller buildings really nestle into the neighborhood, and sometimes they don\u2019t even look like apartment buildings because of the small, human scale,\u201d said Justin Lemma, partner with Build LLC, the Seattle firm that completed Juniper Flats. \u201cThey are really popular, fill up quickly and add some flavor to our city.\u201d<\/p>\n Seattle authorized single-stair residential buildings in 1977. The city\u2019s Department of Construction and Inspections does not track the number of units created or their fire safety record, a spokesperson said.<\/p>\n Lemma said his firm finished about six of these projects in the past seven years, and the 1977 law made them feasible.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThese are tight lots, so things don\u2019t happen easily,\u201d he said, and second staircases take up space, cutting into profits by shrinking or eliminating units. \u201cIf we needed two staircases, the projects wouldn\u2019t work.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n David Lapidus, associate director at Turner & Townsend Heery, a national construction management firm, said low- to moderate-income neighborhoods feel the most pain when construction costs soar.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n He calculated that for a five-story, 10-unit apartment building in Chicago, adding a second concrete-and-steel stairwell tacks $250,000 onto a $3 million development. The loss of rentable space would also subtract tens of thousands of dollars from the building\u2019s annual income.<\/p>\n Landlords in high-income neighborhoods such as Lakeview might be able to soften the blow by charging higher rents, but that wouldn\u2019t be an option across much of the South and West sides, he said.<\/p>\n \u201cIn a huge number of lots across the city, that\u2019s the difference between a building working or not working,\u201d Lapidus said. Allowing more single-staircase structures \u201ccould mean a few thousand more units for the city. It would be very helpful citywide, but particularly in financially challenged areas.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n Alex Montero, co-lead at Strong Towns Chicago, said the groups backing the measure, along with City Council allies such as Martin, have received direct feedback from the Fire Department and made compromises, including cutting their initial request for six-story buildings down to five.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWe believe the current proposal on the table is reasonable,\u201d Montero said, although his group is willing to make additional tweaks. \u201cWe want some version of this reform to pass. Something that brings Chicago more in line with other states and peer cities.\u201d<\/p>\n Lapidus said the fire-protection features in Martin\u2019s ordinance could mean single-staircase buildings are safer for their residents than older properties.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThere are buildings in Chicago right now that are grandfathered in, which have single staircases and no sprinkler systems,\u201d he said. \u201cThat\u2019s where I find a lot of the Fire Department\u2019s arguments usually fall apart.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Firefighters and Buildings Department officials stood together in opposition during the June 4 zoning committee meeting.<\/p>\n Steinmetz, of the firefighters union, reminded committee members that a total of 25 people died in the 1993 Paxton Hotel fire and the 2003 Cook County Administration Building fire, partly because of a lack of usable fire exits. Residents of small buildings also need multiple stairwells in an emergency, he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWhen we discuss six-story buildings, some of you assume that if residents become trapped, firefighters can simply rescue them from windows using aerial ladders,\u201d he said. But trees or cars can block ladders, and \u201ceven when a ladder reaches a window, occupants are likely to be removed one at a time,\u201d he said. \u201cAerial rescues are an emergency measure only.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Chicago Department of Buildings Commissioner Marlene Hopkins urged City Council members to use caution before changing the rules. She said the city\u2019s building code takes into account past fire disasters, and the goal is to ensure residents have several ways to escape a fire.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen one exit has been compromised by fire, smoke, structural failure or emergency operations, occupants and first responders must have an alternative path available,\u201d she said. \u201cA single-stair building removes that redundancy.\u201d<\/p>\n Mark Chubb, a Seattle-based fire safety consultant and former fire chief, told zoning committee members that national studies show small buildings with good sprinkler systems, where residents are just steps from the exit, are extremely safe.<\/p>\n \u201cNearly all residential fire deaths occur in the dwelling units where the fire starts, not in adjacent dwelling units, not corridors and not stairways,\u201d he said. \u201cA choice of two exits will not reduce or eliminate these fire deaths.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Katherine Darnstadt, the founder of Latent, a Chicago-based design firm, said she\u2019s glad officials take safety so seriously, but hopes they can be persuaded to modernize the rules.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cHaving more options for housing design is always better,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd with the single-stair option, even if on the surface it feels less safe, all the additional measures like sprinklers will have a real, positive impact, boost safety and offer an opportunity to bring more density to your typical Chicago lot.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Some aldermen have come out in support, including co-sponsors Bennett Lawson, 44th, Anthony Quezada, 35th, and Ruth Cruz, 30th. Others are skeptical.<\/p>\n \u201cI understand that whatever we can do to reduce total project costs to deliver more affordable units is a good thing,\u201d said Ald. Brendan Reilly, 42nd. \u201cHowever, there are certain, to me, sacred cows we shouldn\u2019t be messing with, and first and foremost is safety.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Ald. Martin\u2019s office said it plans to continue talking with other City Council members, firefighters and city officials.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ve had productive follow-up meetings with (the Department of Buildings) and the mayor\u2019s office, and once we\u2019ve had an opportunity to do the same with the Fire Department, we\u2019ll incorporate their input into a revised ordinance,\u201d said Ryan McCray, director of infrastructure and policy for the 47th Ward.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s critical that we get this right, and if we need a few additional months, that\u2019s fine,\u201d Martin said. \u201cWe should not compromise on safety. Let\u2019s earn people\u2019s support and get them comfortable with commonsense legislation.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A group of advocates is pushing for a change in Chicago\u2019s building code that they say will kick…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":428016,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[148766,132,134,133,148761,2945,148765,148768,148750,148760,148758,148763,148753,148751,148759,148754,148752,148762,148772,148771,148770,148769,148749,148757,148755,16601,148773,148767,148764,148756],"class_list":["post-428015","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-austin","tag-alex-montero","tag-austin","tag-austin-headlines","tag-austin-news","tag-ballard","tag-chicago","tag-chicago-city-council","tag-chicago-department-of-buildings","tag-chicago-fire-fighters-union-local-2","tag-congress-for-the-new-urbanism","tag-cut-the-tape-agenda","tag-david-lapidus","tag-depaul-university","tag-erik-steinmetz","tag-gov-jb-pritzker","tag-illinois-economic-policy-institute","tag-institute-for-housing-studies","tag-juniper-flats","tag-katherine-darnstadt","tag-latent","tag-mark-chubb","tag-marlene-hopkins","tag-matt-martin","tag-mayor-brandon-johnson","tag-project-for-middle-class-renewal","tag-seattle","tag-single-staircase","tag-strong-towns-chicago","tag-turner-townsend-heery","tag-university-of-illinois-urbana-champaign"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/428015","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=428015"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/428015\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/428016"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=428015"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=428015"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=428015"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Gary](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/CTC-L-Single-Stair015_264020467.jpg\")
Gary Scott, left, and Sean Hemenway, both co-lead competition organizers, give a presentation during a design competition for single-stair apartment buildings held at the GFT offices at Prudential Plaza in Chicago’s Loop on June 23, 2026. The competition is set to allow participants to design single-stair buildings for review by a panel of judges at the end of the summer. (Josh Boland\/Chicago Tribune)<\/p>\n![\"Seattle's](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/CTC-L-SINGLE-STAIR-01.jpg\")
Seattle’s Juniper Flats, developed in 2023, has four units per floor, all connected by a single staircase. (Build LLC)<\/p>\n