Pacifica, CA Building Safety: Fire Sprinkler Requirements (2026)

2 for the City of Pacifica. Under subsection A, an automatic fire sprinkler system is mandatory in all new occupancies and locations citywide, with a single carve-out for a detached Group U accessory structure of 1,000 square feet or less built alongside an R-3 single-family dwelling. Subsection B extends the mandate to existing buildings: whenever an addition is built onto an existing structure, sprinklers must be installed throughout the entire building, not just the new addition. Three exceptions apply: an addition to an R-3 dwelling under 1,000 square feet, or an addition to any other occupancy under 500 square feet, triggers no sprinkler requirement at all; the construction of an accessory dwelling unit never triggers a retrofit requirement for the existing dwelling, even where the ADU work is combined with an addition; and the Fire Code Official may grant a case-by-case exemption.

22 requires car stacker garage areas to be protected by an automatic wet-pipe system built to NFPA 13, with non-extended coverage sidewall sprinklers covering no more than 80 square feet each under every parking level, including the pit level. Coverage required for hydraulic calculation can be reduced from 2,500 square feet down to 1,500 square feet where one-hour fire-rated walls separate the stacker areas. , effective January 1, 2026.