Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Miscellaneous/2018 January 25

= January 25 =

Houses at street level in the USA
Half way down this article is a photo of a house showing a set of stairs leading up from the fairly flat street level, to the front door. Is this a common design feature of homes of that era in the USA and if so what was the functional reason for it? Was it to allow coal deliveries to the little white door without having to dig out much of a coal cellar? --Dweller (talk) Become old fashioned! 12:35, 25 January 2018 (UTC)
 * It does look like a door to access a storage area, either for coal or wood, or whatever. A door like this would usually be located in the back of a house, but in this case, there would be no way to reach the back of the house with a delivery vehicle, such as a coal van, as there is no side or back alley visible. --Xuxl (talk) 14:33, 25 January 2018 (UTC)
 * It looks like the cellar might be partially above and partially below ground level. There may not be access to the cellar from the interior of the house. You are referring to the photo with the caption under it reading "One of the few remaining houses in Centralia, its neighbours long gone", right? Bus stop (talk) 15:02, 25 January 2018 (UTC)
 * For houses in the U.S. there are two common foundations: concrete slab foundations, where the ground is leveled and where a flat concrete slab is poured and the house built upon it, and basement-type foundations, where a cavity is dug into the earth, and the house rests on pilings (columns or pilars) above the open space. In the second type of construction, the front door is not often on street level; there are usually stairs up to the front door; this is because crawl space vents or basement windows need to be somewhat above the surface themselves to allow proper ventilation; houses built on basements or crawl spaces invariably have at least one or two steps up to the front door, whereas houses on concrete slabs have the doors at ground level.  Compare this or this house, built on concrete slabs; the door is at most a half step up from the ground, and that's mostly just because the slab is level and the earth around it is not.  There's no crawl space vents or basement windows because there's no lower level.  this is what it looks like under a house with a crawl space; a basement is just one of these which is big enough to stand up in.  That space needs ventilation, which means the floor above it has to be above ground level by some nontrivial amount, as in here or here or the image you see above.  In the northern US, crawl space/basement construction is more common because air has an insulating effect; it is cheaper to heat the living space of such a house than it is when the house is resting on a giant concrete slab, which acts as a heat sink, and causes the floors to remain perpetually cold in the winter.  Slab construction is more common in warmer regions of the US, or in regions where a high water table makes basements impractical.  -- Jayron 32 15:32, 25 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Excellent answer! Matt Deres (talk) 17:25, 25 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Your answer for basements covers crawlspace houses but isn't clear (to me at least) that you are covering both basements and crawlspaces at the same time. In the South, it is very common for houses without basements to be placed on a raised frame (as though it has a basement). There is just enough room for a crawlspace below the bottom floor. The goal is to increase airflow below the house to cool it down. It is a very common design for shotgun houses (long/narrow houses). 209.149.113.5 (talk) 17:30, 25 January 2018 (UTC)
 * There's little difference between a basement and a crawlspace excepting head clearance; basements can (but do not always) have finished floors and walls; sometimes just bare frames, sometimes just pilings and dirt floors like what is called a crawlspace. Usually, if it's tall enough to stand in comfortably it is called a basement, and if not, a crawlspace.  If you read the Wikipedia article titled basement, you would not have been confused by this "An underground crawl space (as the name implies) is a type of basement in which one cannot stand up"  -- Jayron 32 06:04, 26 January 2018 (UTC)
 * How common are (or were) heavy snow dumps in that area of Pennsylvania? If there's been 3 foot (1 metre) of snow, you may be grateful that your front door is above ground level. LongHairedFop (talk) 20:38, 25 January 2018 (UTC)
 * A Founding Father saw 3 feet in one storm in Virginia and Pennsylvania saw 38.3 inches near Maryland in the Blizzard of 2016 and an especially heavy spot of New York City saw 34 inches in that storm so that seems possible. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 21:06, 25 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Another benefit of putting the first floor above grade is the ability to put windows that make the basement bright enough to see with only free light in the daytime. I have heard that when a 19th century first floor is above grade it's because the streets weren't clean then with horse manure and maybe dust. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 20:59, 25 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Building a house with entries on ground level is an invitation to all animals and insects in the area. --Kharon (talk) 01:04, 26 January 2018 (UTC)
 * In the inner city where buildings don't have front yards, it stops people in the street from peeking through the ground floor windows. Also, building and ventilating a sub-basement is more practical when the basement is allowed to jut above road level. 93.142.116.5 (talk) 01:16, 26 January 2018 (UTC)


 * Old houses very often have a significant portion of the basement protruding above ground level, to allow for windows and hence sunlight, as noted earlier. Houses which have all or most of the basement above ground have been called "basement houses". Some examples: ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 01:26, 26 January 2018 (UTC)
 * In Chicago these are called "garden apartments". -- Jayron 32 06:07, 26 January 2018 (UTC)

Some really interesting answers here, thank you guys. --Dweller (talk) Become old fashioned! 09:38, 26 January 2018 (UTC)


 * I don't see a link to split-level home above. My parents have one.  You walk up five steps in the front of my parents' house to enter the front door.  That level has a foyer, a kitchen and a formal living and dining room.  Down six steps are the rec-room, the laundry, a toilet and sink, the garage, and a door to the back yard, as the house is on a mild slope, with the back lower than the front.  These two floors have windows on the front yard, albeit at a six-foot offset.


 * Six steps up from the foyer are most of the bedrooms and two and a half bathrooms. Six steps up from that is a furnished attice room (secondary master bedroom with large closets but not its own bath) and six steps down from the rec-room is the basement, separated into an office, workspace with tools, and the furnace room with a lot of stored items on shelves.  The arrangement avoids long, dangerous stairways.  I slid down a full storey at my neighbor's house when young, and could not stand for an hour.


 * The rec-room stays cool in the summer and warm in the winter as it is on average a few feet below the soil level. This is a very common and desirable house design where they live, and realtors love it.  The home has more than quintupled in value over 40 years.  The basement has three windows at the ceiling level, one of which was bricked over.  There's outside light, and tornadoes are rare, although we have had two nearby.   Hurrican Sandy 's eye came ashore where my parents had just sold their summer home, and the eye passed over their house (where I spent Halloween) and the home suffered no damage, while non-split level houses had major damage. μηδείς (talk) 06:52, 27 January 2018 (UTC)