Sounds reasonable to include spectators as transients since they will be using the facility's facilities such as restrooms, bike racks, and parking spaces.

If you run into any inconsistencies for water use, you can look into defining different "fixture groups" in the WE credit calculations. You'll probably want to do that, since building staff, athletes, and spectators will all have different water use patterns that are reasonable to predict.

The 60 visitors sounds more accurate than the 30 visitors since that averages out to occuring every other week, which is pretty often. It might be argued that the 100 visitor count is "regularly occuring" since it can be expected twice a year, but it doesn't seem very reasonable to call that "regular."

Lauren,
Seems like you could exclude vertical distance traveled by elevator, but you probably need to calculate the horizontal travel distance from your project's entry to the shower room. Off the top of my head I don't remember seeing credit or CIRCredit Interpretation Ruling. Used by design team members experiencing difficulties in the application of a LEED prerequisite or credit to a project. Typically, difficulties arise when specific issues are not directly addressed by LEED information/guide wording that was this specific.

Lauren,

Assuming your project building is contiguous to the building with the showers, I think you have some flexibility. What you may run into is having to prove shower capacity for both buildings FTEs. I've not had to do any horizontal travel distances but I take these things to a campus level fairly quickly and approach it that way.

I looked up the HC reference for inpatient facilities which says the shower and changing facilities need to be in the building or within 200 yards of a primary staff building entry. You may be able to work that into your narrative.

A similar question came up over on the v2009 page for this credit, but with version 2.2 we dont have the option of defining different fixture groups in the WE credits to correct these variations.

What percent of your FTEFull-time equivalent (FTE) represents a regular building occupant who spends 8 hours a day (40 hours a week) in the project building. Part-time or overtime occupants have FTE values based on their hours per day divided by 8 (or hours per week divided by 40). Transient Occupants can be reported as either daily totals or as part of the FTE. Residential occupancy should be estimated based on the number and size of units. Core and Shell projects should refer to the default occupancy table in the Reference Guide appendix. All occupant assumptions must be consistent across all credits in all categories. numbers has this type of user? If it's a small fraction of the total users it probably wouldn't make much difference whether they are counted as part time FTEs or transients. But if all of the users used the facility the same two days of the month, and the rest of the days it sits empty, then you would want to count each person as a full FTE, since that represents the "typical occupancy" while the building is in use.

You might try to use the FTE number to represent the typical or typical peak number of "staff" people, and use the Transient number to represent the people who are dropping in for shorter periods of time. Post back here if that doesnt make sense or if you have any related questions.

Hi Lynne,

If the only building occupants are transient visitors, you won't have to include regular building occupants (FTEs) in the calculation, unless you want to calculate them as FTE. They can simply be counted as daily totals. You may also find helpful information in this LEEDUser forum: http://www.leeduser.com/topic/calculating-ftes.

Not a simple question! It might depend on how you define each phase, and whether each phase is a separate stand-alone building that meets its own functional needs. In general, your FTEFull-time equivalent (FTE) represents a regular building occupant who spends 8 hours a day (40 hours a week) in the project building. Part-time or overtime occupants have FTE values based on their hours per day divided by 8 (or hours per week divided by 40). Transient Occupants can be reported as either daily totals or as part of the FTE. Residential occupancy should be estimated based on the number and size of units. Core and Shell projects should refer to the default occupancy table in the Reference Guide appendix. All occupant assumptions must be consistent across all credits in all categories. should represent the planned long-term occupancy and use of the spaces you are certifying. That might mean including FTE from future phases, if people from phase 3 activities will be using phase 1 & 2 spaces. Make sense?

Hi Keelan,

If the bike racks are used by another building, you would need to show that there are enough to accomodate both FTEs. IF you can show this then I think it would not matter that they are outside of the LEED Boundary, though I am not positive.

Anyone have experience with this?

Yes, the bike racks can be outside the LEED boundary, as Emily explained. Make sure you meet the conditions of MPR Supplemental Guidance Revision #2, 9-1-2011, page 25, for when facilites used to meet a credit are outside the LEED boundary.

Yes, mall visitors and customers are considered transient occupants and must be included in the number of bike racks. Transient occupants do not need to be included in the calculation for showers - the showers are only needed for employees.

You'll need to estimate the number of transients for the mall. Page 58 of the 2.0 Core and Shell Reference Guide has more detail on how this is done. This version of CS doesn't give a default number for estimating transient users, but you could probably use the v2009 default numbers found in Appendix 1.

For General Retail, the default we can use for estimating occupancy is 1 transient person for every 130 square feet of the total project area (gross sf). The number for employees is the same in version 2009 and 2.0: 1 employee for every 550 sf.

We haven't seen projects being allowed to exclude occupants from bike rack calculations in situations where it is mainly a question of attire or custom, since part of the goal of LEED is to reward projects for shifting expectations and behavior. Also, given the multiple uses and functions that can take place in a hotel, the reviewer may not accept that argument.

However, there are several CIRs that did allow a hotels to assume that overnight guests would not be arriving by bike, but ruled that some transients could be expected to come by bike - see interpretation #3130 in the interpretations database. For more background on this, also see interpretations 2494, 2422, 2082, 1936, 3116, 1698, and 1766.

Yes, in a mixed use building you need to calculate the # of racks for the commercial space based on 5% of the peak occupancy (FTEFull-time equivalent (FTE) represents a regular building occupant who spends 8 hours a day (40 hours a week) in the project building. Part-time or overtime occupants have FTE values based on their hours per day divided by 8 (or hours per week divided by 40). Transient Occupants can be reported as either daily totals or as part of the FTE. Residential occupancy should be estimated based on the number and size of units. Core and Shell projects should refer to the default occupancy table in the Reference Guide appendix. All occupant assumptions must be consistent across all credits in all categories. and transients), and add that to the number you get for 15% of the residential occupancy. (See 2.2 reference guide page 56)

Since many ground floor commercial spaces are built only as a core and shell space until retail tenants move in later, you can always use the default FTE numbers found in the Core and Shell appendix 1.

For example, per the appendix 1, General Retail is assumed to have one employee per 550 sf of gross sf, and 1 transient per 130 gsf. (Restaurants have higher occupancy - 435sf per FTE and 95 sf per transient)

So for 10,000 sf of retail, we get 18.2 FTE and 76.9 transients. With no formula for calculating peak transients, we might assume that the peak number of transients is, say, 40% of 76.9 or 30.1. Our peak occupancy for bike racks would thus be 18.2 + 30.1 = 48.3, and 5% of that would be 2.4 which we round up to get 3 bike racks for the commercial spaces.

Showers are tricky. The residential occupants would have their own showers, and we don't have to provide any for the retail transients, but what about the retail FTE employees? In an all-commercial core and shell buildings we still have to provide showers for the estimated FTE.

In past version 2.2 mixed-use projects with core and shell retail spaces that made up less than 10% of the building gross sf, the building is considered overall as a "residential" building, but we still have to provide bike racks for the retail staff and transients based on the estimated occupancy, same as I described here. But since the owner does not control the build out of the small retail tenant improvements, the USGBC/ GBCI position has not required that showers be provided in the base building for those future retail employees as long as the building's tenant improvement guidelines encouraged the retail tenants to follow LEED guidelines for their build out and provide showers if possible.

Does that address your situation?

I have a similar project, retail ground floor (less than 10% building gross sf) with residential above. In version 2009, can I consider this a residential project and not provide showers for the future retail employees?

Christi, if this is a 2009 question, can you please post it to our SSc4.2 v2009 forum? Thanks.

See the last paragraph in the Birds-Eye View above about visitors and FTEFull-time equivalent (FTE) represents a regular building occupant who spends 8 hours a day (40 hours a week) in the project building. Part-time or overtime occupants have FTE values based on their hours per day divided by 8 (or hours per week divided by 40). Transient Occupants can be reported as either daily totals or as part of the FTE. Residential occupancy should be estimated based on the number and size of units. Core and Shell projects should refer to the default occupancy table in the Reference Guide appendix. All occupant assumptions must be consistent across all credits in all categories.'s. It's up to you to define what reasonable for average and peak occupancy of the building (it won't be as high as code occupancy). So if only two lockers rooms would be in use at peak, use that.

The FTE's would include building employees and part-time staff, (who need bike racks and showers). Spectators would not be part of the FTE - they'd be visitors (who need only bike racks, not showers).

Based on the program and use of the facility you'll want to decide whether regular users of the facility are considered FTEs or visitors - probably doesn't make a big difference, since you'll have plenty of showers.

Thanks, David - the Code occupancy count is very high, almost the entire student population of the college! I'll look at it again and make a decision on the occupancy.

Since there is not a exact requirement - it's up to the design team's professional judgement to use a number that is realistic, and reasonable for the specific project.

Some projects have used 1 or 1.5 people for a studio, but if you think 2 is more accurate for the number of people who will live there then you should use that.

Some buildings may have more or less occupants than a regional average - retirement housing, student housing, low-income, or worker housing, for example, may be different. You'll need to explain who are the typical occupants in the building and what are your assumptions about the number of people who will live there.

Yes, I would count them as transients in a classroom building. Staff with offices or others that work in the building all day would be the FTEs.

I was trying to exclude them all together for the shower calc since they would probably not use the shower facilities. I would definitely include them for the bike rack calc. Does this make sense? More importantly, how do you think GBCI will see it?

Makes sense and I think that GBCI will see it the same way. But only they can tell us that. Let us know how it goes.

Yes, it should be based on distance traveled by the pedestrian. If it were based on distance as a crow flies, then locations would be allowed that were quite inaccessible in practice—not a good solution.

If I'm not following properly, I apologize, but it sounds like the CIRCredit Interpretation Ruling. Used by design team members experiencing difficulties in the application of a LEED prerequisite or credit to a project. Typically, difficulties arise when specific issues are not directly addressed by LEED information/guide is simply saying you have to change from using the pilot version of LEED-Retail to using the final version of LEED-Retail. I don't read it as saying that the substitution is invalid.

I am picturing a spreadsheet in which you map out across 24 hours all the shifts and their associated FTEs. This seems like a simple solution, although with a big project just pinning down the data might be a trick.

We are addressing thison a project now. GBCI imagines that the maximum FTEFull-time equivalent (FTE) represents a regular building occupant who spends 8 hours a day (40 hours a week) in the project building. Part-time or overtime occupants have FTE values based on their hours per day divided by 8 (or hours per week divided by 40). Transient Occupants can be reported as either daily totals or as part of the FTE. Residential occupancy should be estimated based on the number and size of units. Core and Shell projects should refer to the default occupancy table in the Reference Guide appendix. All occupant assumptions must be consistent across all credits in all categories. is the sum of the two shifts for the purposes of the bike rack count. Makes sense since somebody who rode their bike would not beable to leave until their shift was relieved. If you have staggered shifts, you will have to calculate the worst case scenario. I would think a table or graph would work well to document the numbers. Don't forget the transients.

Sue, there is an FTEFull-time equivalent (FTE) represents a regular building occupant who spends 8 hours a day (40 hours a week) in the project building. Part-time or overtime occupants have FTE values based on their hours per day divided by 8 (or hours per week divided by 40). Transient Occupants can be reported as either daily totals or as part of the FTE. Residential occupancy should be estimated based on the number and size of units. Core and Shell projects should refer to the default occupancy table in the Reference Guide appendix. All occupant assumptions must be consistent across all credits in all categories. calc on LEED Online in the Occupant Usage Data Form, which we recommend using.

Can you please indicate where exactly the Occupant Usage Data Form is located?

I'm registered on Leed online for a V2.2 project and don't see this form and can't find it on the USGBC website either.

Thanks

Christopher, the previous discussion was referring to a form used in LEED Online v3 documentation for LEED 2009 projects.

This form is not used for NC v2.2, which uses LEED Online v2.

We hit on this point in the Checklists tab above: "Per numerous CIRCredit Interpretation Ruling. Used by design team members experiencing difficulties in the application of a LEED prerequisite or credit to a project. Typically, difficulties arise when specific issues are not directly addressed by LEED information/guide rulings, showers can be located off-site within 200 yards of a building entrance as long as they are accessible to building occupants. For example, a building owner could provide occupants with free access to gym facilities nearby to comply with the credit requirements."

You would not have to alter the LEED project boundary to encompass such showers. I agree this would be a massive can of worms!

Hi Tristan. Re your reply, would 2 separate shower facilities meeting the required number of fixtures/spaces but still within 200 yards be acceptable. I'm assuming it would but I'd also like to hear your thoughts. Thanks.

Sounds acceptable to me, especially if there is clear signage or other means of informing bikers of both shower locations.

I recently received comments back from a reviewer requesting me to provide FTEs for the adjacent building's occupants to confirm compliance with the showers and to provide bike racks for those occupants as well.... Someone please help me find the CIRs to reference that I don't need to do this. It is a v2.2 LEED NC project. I just tried to search USGBC's CIR database but it keeps crashing.

I have run into this same comment from a reviewer (v2.2), and fought it but with no luck, and had to drop the credit. There is no addenda, or CIRCredit Interpretation Ruling. Used by design team members experiencing difficulties in the application of a LEED prerequisite or credit to a project. Typically, difficulties arise when specific issues are not directly addressed by LEED information/guide that I have found that explains this requirement. Basically the reviewer wants to ensure that the required number of racks and showers will be open and available to your project's occupants. So, if those racks and showers are accessible to people from other buildings, you either have to provide signage that excludes other people outside the project from using the showers/racks, or provide enough showers/racks to accomodate anybody who might use them. If the showers are in your building, then it would be reasonable to assume the adjacent building occupants won't have access. But, if the bike racks are right out front, you will need either signage or more racks.

If you find a CIR that contradicts this, please post it to the forum!