manuallyfocused
Active Member
Does anyone else have curtains that cover exit doors in their facility? How is this handled with your AHJ? This is our situation:
Our "theater" is a multi-purpose auditorium with three pairs of glass doors at the back of the house and windows all along one wall. As you can imagine, all the glass lets in lots of light (and the doors open out to an area with cars passing by, so at night we get lots of headlight drive-bys). Each of these doors is a clearly marked emergency exit, and each has a manual hand-operated curtain track between the door and the exit sign (such that the exit sign is visible when the curtains are closed). The doors and windows have had curtains since before our organization occupied the facility (at least 9 years ago) and we have replaced the curtains once during that time. In the last several years, our building manager has instructed our security team that the curtains must remain open at all times, but has a working arrangement with me that the curtains can be closed during productions and tech rehearsals. This doesn't always get communicated to the security team, so we occasionally have situations where a security guard is assigned to monitor the room during a production/event, and tries to open the curtains mid-show. It's uncomfortable and stressful for everyone.
Should I push for a clearer policy on the use of the curtains? Or should I push for the doors to be replaced with something that doesn't put us potentially out of compliance with our AHJ? Has anyone navigated this sort of issue successfully?
Thanks for any advice.
Our "theater" is a multi-purpose auditorium with three pairs of glass doors at the back of the house and windows all along one wall. As you can imagine, all the glass lets in lots of light (and the doors open out to an area with cars passing by, so at night we get lots of headlight drive-bys). Each of these doors is a clearly marked emergency exit, and each has a manual hand-operated curtain track between the door and the exit sign (such that the exit sign is visible when the curtains are closed). The doors and windows have had curtains since before our organization occupied the facility (at least 9 years ago) and we have replaced the curtains once during that time. In the last several years, our building manager has instructed our security team that the curtains must remain open at all times, but has a working arrangement with me that the curtains can be closed during productions and tech rehearsals. This doesn't always get communicated to the security team, so we occasionally have situations where a security guard is assigned to monitor the room during a production/event, and tries to open the curtains mid-show. It's uncomfortable and stressful for everyone.
Should I push for a clearer policy on the use of the curtains? Or should I push for the doors to be replaced with something that doesn't put us potentially out of compliance with our AHJ? Has anyone navigated this sort of issue successfully?
Thanks for any advice.