My wife is greatly enamored with the idea of a laundry chute to take clothes from upstairs to the laundry room in a hurry.
Since we’re moving, and hope to be moving into a house, does anyone know the legalities of such a handy laundry tunnel? I seem to recall reading that they were illegal, as they could be a gateway for fire.
anyone?
We’re talking about rural Western Penn.
Thanks!
There is one in the house I lived in in Michigan. Of course, they are only useful if the laundry hook-ups are in the basement. Most newer houses I have seen have a laundry closet off the kitchen or near the bedrooms.
I would imagine that also, depending on the design, they could pose a safety hazard to very young children/pets.
I found the following on Google:
http://doityourself.com/info/laundrychutes.htm
I found references to laundry chutes in homes in Pennsylvania, so they’re probably legal there.
I’m not sure, but it would seem that only local/state building codes would cover this. Also, it may only apply to multi unit buildings, single family homes may be exempt.
My grandmother lives in western PA, and has a laundry chute in her house. Then again, her house is about a century old, so they might not be legal in new construction.
I am not sure if they are used in new construction, but I bought a house last year that was built in 1969 in eastern Ohio and it has a laundry chute. I know two other such houses, built around the same time, in two other NE Ohio cities that have them.
They may not be a part of new construction, but if your wife really wants one you should definitely be able to find an older house that has one.
offtopic: my house also has a milk door in the garage. I didn’t realize they still delivered milk in the late sixties. How quaint!
FWIW, I’ve seen them in new construction houses where I live in Florida.
My Grandmothers house burned down about 15 years ago, so about 1990 or so. They rebuilt it and also left the laundry chute as it had been before the fire. It has a handy wooden box thing with a latchable door for the laundry to collect in. 
This is in central ohio.
Agreed. I searched the PA building code here and didn’t find much.
Best advice:
ZipperJJ FWIW, we were getting milk delivered in the early 70s in Oak Park, MI.
My house was built in 1953, and has the laundry chute (from the 1st floor bathroom to the basement). I love it! We also have a boarded-over milk door in our garage. I wonder when milk-delivery ended for Northeastern Ohio?
In the 70s, when my mom & dad started redoing their house (built in the early 30s), I tried to talk them into a laundry chute to the basement, because I just thought that would be cool. Mom put the laundry room upstairs, so she wouldn’t have to lug all the clean clothes up two flights. Spoilsport!
There was no milk door, but it did come with an icebox! Those have delivery doors on the outside, for the iceman to load ice into. I guess maybe the milkman could just put the milk right into the icebox.
I’m still angling for a dumbwaiter for that house…
My house is 70 years old, and I have a laundry chute with doors on the first and second floors, and a receptacle in the basement. Only once has one of my cats gotten into the 2nd-floor door, and fortunately had a soft landing in the basement.
We also have a milk chute and a coal chute door, though the coal furnace has been long-since replaced.
When I was a kid I lived in Montreal and one of my girlfriends lived in old Montreal, in a big old house with a laundry chute.
We used to slide down it into the dirty laundry at the bottom.
I have a feeling we would have been in trouble if we’d ever been busted.
Well if you’d been my brother, you certainly would have been. At least I was when caught.
Why would they be a gateway for fire?
My parents house, and all my aunts & uncles houses had them. Built in 1950’s or 60’s. They were chutes made of the same metal that the heating ducts were made from. They fit into the 16" space between 2x4 studs in the wall.
Very handy with a basement laundry room. And fun for kids. We once had a cat that liked to sit at the upstairs chute door, watching for someone to use one of the lower doors. Then he would leap into the chute, flying down it to attack that piece of laundry that you had just thrown in there. Startling as heck to visitors.
But I can’t see why they would cause any increased risk of fire.
First they were lined with metal, thus somewhat fire resistant.
Second, as far as serving as chimneys to draw air to the fire or to allow it to spread between floors, I can’t see where they are more of a fire danger than all the spaces between studs in the walls. Such empty spaces are in all the interior walls, and many are completely open, without any cross bracing. Plus they are made of more burnable material than the metal of the laundry chute.
I just don’t understand why they would be considered a fire risk.
1st is that you are making another passage for fire or air
2nd is that many wall spaces have, I forget what they are called, but basically 2x4’s across the space, blocking the chimey effect.
3rd, it is a passage open from living space floor 1 to living space on floor 2 - many with unrestricted openings, and even if they did have a door, it frequently fails, wall spaces are usually closed to living spaces on both ends.
4 Heating ducts can also be problematic in fires, but that doesn’t change that a laundry chute is also a fire danger.
5 There may be a pile of combustionable material directly below this chute.
I think they’re simply called ‘firestops’.
I have no idea about northeastern Ohio, but here in Nashville, you can still get home milk deliveries. :> (I think that’s just awesomely cool too, though I don’t take advantage of it)
We still got our dairy products delivered by the milk man in the seventies (but see my location). I don’t think he gave up the route until the 1980s.