Ohio Building Design Criteria: What the State Fixes

Ohio takes a middle path between states that fix every design criterion centrally and states that leave the whole table to local officials. 2(1) of the Residential Code of Ohio arrives with four columns already completed and applying statewide: wind speed at 115 mph, weathering classified as severe, termite risk as moderate to heavy, and ice barrier underlayment required. Those four are the criteria that genuinely do not vary meaningfully across Ohio. Everything else in the table is delegated by footnote to the jurisdiction, ground snow load, frost line depth, seismic design category, flood hazard entry date, air freezing index and mean annual temperature each carry a note directing the jurisdiction to fill it in.

The Manual J design criteria section is deleted outright, with the code stating that owners shall use Manual J when required. The severe weathering classification is the entry with the widest practical reach: a footnote provides that where weathering requires a higher strength concrete or grade of masonry than the structural requirements alone would need, the weathering requirement governs.

These criteria are enforced at plan review and inspection by the local jurisdiction rather than by the state. The recurring failure is specifying concrete or masonry that satisfies the structural calculation but not the severe weathering classification: the footnote exists precisely because that substitution looks compliant on paper and is not.