Basement Stairs

I woke up thinking about this--it's a simple wood box with plywood doors, so why haven't I built it yet? I've wrung my hands over this little project on these pages before: Basement Door, Basement Stairs and the Lumber Yard, Clever Solution for BR2 Egress. After an hour or so thinking about it, I realized that that is not the solution I would propose to a client.

The geometry problem is due to the top tread being 2' wide, while the other treads are more like 8". This draws the front of the Bilco door triangle away from the house and makes a standard door seem too short. Standard basement doors assume standard runs of stairs.

So, here's the solution: pour new concrete steps at the top so that the tread and risers are more uniform. With the base of the Bilco door closer to the house, a standard size door will work. While we're dealing with concrete, build up the curbs on either side (where the failed wood railings are).

Status as of October 2024

Egress window from BR2--land on Bilco door, not the stair pit.

The new insight is--1) change the steps--that wide tread at the top is the problem. Need to raise a curb on both sides--that's a concrete situation. Drill and epoxy some rebar and form the side walls. Paint to match the exposed concrete foundation as shown above. Finish the top with a Bilco door. Where the wide tread was, fill in the gap. Make the new concrete slope from the Bilco door away from the house.

Update 10/23/24: Here's how it pencils out. Because there's a landing outside the basement door, there has to be a similar-width thing for a roof. That is, Bilco doors open on stairs, not stairs and a bottom landing. But that similar-width roof provides a landing pad for someone escaping out the BR2 window. I'm thinking mineral roll roofing (as we used for the chicken coop on Foster) with a Trex deck resting on it on sleepers.