N.Y. Multiple Dwelling Law § 213: Lighting and ventilation of rooms

§ 213. Lighting and ventilation of rooms. 1. No tenement, its lot or

any room, public hall or stairs therein shall be so altered as to have

its light or ventilation diminished in any way not approved by the

department.

2. In every tenement erected after April twelfth, nineteen hundred

one, every stair hall, public hall and living room and at least one

water-closet compartment or bathroom containing a water-closet in each

apartment, shall have at least one window opening directly upon a street

or upon a lawful yard or court existing on April eighteenth, nineteen

hundred twenty-nine. Such window shall be so located as to properly

light all portions of such hall, room or compartment. Every part of an

apartment of three rooms or less in such a tenement shall be within

eighteen feet of a street or yard or have a window opening upon a lawful

inner or outer court existing on April eighteenth, nineteen hundred

twenty-nine. When a room in a tenement opens upon an inner court on a

lot line and less than ten feet wide from the lot line to the opposite

wall of the dwelling, such room shall be provided with a sash window

communicating with another room in the same apartment. Such window shall

contain at least ten square feet of glazed surface and be made so as to

open readily.

3. No room in any old-law tenement shall be occupied for living

purposes unless it meets the conditions in one of the following

paragraphs:

a. Such room has a window opening directly upon a street, or upon a

yard at least four feet in depth, or above the roof of an adjoining

building, or upon a court or shaft at least twenty square feet in area

open to the sky.

b. Such room is located on the top story and is adequately lighted by

a ventilating skylight opening directly to the outer air.

c. Such room has a sash window opening directly into an immediately

adjoining room in the same apartment which latter room opens directly on

a street or yard at least four feet in depth. Such window shall have a

vertically sliding pulley-hung sash not less than three feet by five

feet, except that when it is impossible to construct a window of such

size, the department may permit such window to be narrower. Both halves

of the sash shall be made so as to open readily, and the lower half

shall be glazed with translucent glass, or with obscure wire glass if

the department shall so require. So far as possible such window shall be

in line with windows in outer rooms opening on a street or yard, so as

to afford a maximum of light and ventilation.

d. Such room has an alcove opening, of no less dimension than required

for such a sash window, to such an adjoining room, in addition to the

usual door openings.

4. In every existing tenement the department, in addition to the

requirements of subdivision four of section eighty, may, as often as it

deems necessary, require the walls and ceilings of every room that does

not open directly on a street to be kalsomined or painted white to

improve the lighting of such room.

5. Notwithstanding anything in this section to the contrary, no room

in any old-law tenement in an apartment which is vacant on June

thirtieth, nineteen hundred sixty, or thereafter becomes vacant, and, on

and after June thirtieth, nineteen hundred seventy no room in any

old-law tenement shall be used for living purposes unless such room

shall have a window opening directly upon the street, or upon a yard not

less than four feet deep, or above the roof of an adjoining building, or

upon a court or shaft of not less than twenty square feet in area, open

to the sky without roof or skylight, unless such room is located on the

top floor and is adequately lighted and ventilated by a skylight opening

directly to the outer air.

An alcove shall be deemed to comply with the requirements of this

subdivision if (1) it opens directly into an immediately adjoining room

in the same apartment, and (2) such adjoining room opens directly on a

street or yard, and (3) a single unbroken open space occupies at least

sixty per centum of the area of the vertical plane between the alcove

and such adjoining room. The required open space between any such alcove

and an adjoining room through which it receives light and ventilation

shall not be obstructed by any curtain, portiere, fixed or movable

partition or other contrivance or device.