Property type
Hotels and Hospitality Properties
Guestroom separations, corridors and vertical shafts carry the life-safety load in a hotel. Brand renovations and inspections are usually when the accumulated conditions come to light.
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Where the problems concentrate
- Guestroom demising walls. Room-to-room and room-to-corridor separations, especially at the head of wall.
- Corridor ceilings. Decades of cable, conduit, sprinkler and low-voltage runs crossing rated corridor walls above the ceiling line.
- PTAC and through-wall equipment. Sleeves and openings created or enlarged during equipment replacement cycles.
- Vertical shafts. Elevator, laundry, trash and mechanical chases running the full height of the building.
- Back of house. Kitchen, laundry and mechanical spaces where separations from guest areas are frequently penetrated by equipment and utilities.
Renovation cycles are the usual trigger
Hotels renovate on a schedule that most other building types do not. Brand-mandated property improvement plans, guestroom refreshes, technology upgrades and equipment replacement all open assemblies — and each cycle adds penetrations unless somebody is specifically responsible for firestopping.
The result is that a property on its third or fourth renovation cycle can have layers of undocumented conditions above the corridor ceiling, none of which were visible until the current project exposed them.
If you are planning a PIP or a guestroom renovation, assigning firestopping explicitly — and budgeting for pre-existing conditions found during demolition — is far cheaper than discovering both at closeout.
Working around occupancy and revenue
Hotels rarely close for this work. That means phased floor-by-floor scheduling, night and low-occupancy work windows, strict containment in guest areas, and crews that understand they are working in a live hospitality environment.
It is a real constraint on which contractors are appropriate. A firm that does excellent work in new construction may not be equipped for phased occupied-property scheduling. Tell us about your occupancy and timing in the checkup and we will factor it into the introduction.
Common questions
Can this work be done without taking rooms out of service?
Corridor and shaft work often can be phased with limited room impact. Conditions inside guestrooms generally require the room to be out of service, which is why the work is usually scheduled by floor during low-occupancy periods.
Our brand PIP is coming up. Should firestopping be in scope?
It is worth addressing deliberately. A PIP opens assemblies across the property, which both creates new penetrations and exposes old ones. Handling it during the project is substantially less expensive than after finishes are installed.
Who is responsible for penetrations created by our cable and internet vendors?
That depends on your agreements, and in practice it is often unassigned. Establishing a single responsible party for firestopping, including vendor-created penetrations, prevents the conditions from accumulating between renovation cycles.
We had findings in one wing. Does the rest of the property need to be checked?
Often yes. The conditions that created findings in one wing were usually created by the same work practices throughout, so isolated findings tend to indicate a pattern.
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