Rich Bergmen is the founder and owner of Decksgo.com and has over 20 years of deck building and custom home experience. Rich's goal is to use his and other builders' experience to "provide building tips, techniques, and videos from real projects so you can build a better deck," states Rich.
The Decksgo.com website also provides calculators, free project plans, and how-to videos; invites discussion through the site forum; has a pro builder locator; and recommends products that make for easy and effective installations through his online store.
Rich has given me permission to share some of his articles and the infographic below makes it easy to know the most common residential guardrail codes in North America.
From Rich:
These deck railing height diagrams are a great reference for your design and building portfolio. They include the actual height of the rail above the deck, the height above grade when a guardrail is required and important baluster spacing dimensions.
We have also created separate illustrations for residential guards for the USA and Canada - depending on where you live. There are some minor differences.
For a more extensive summary of other code standards, please see this article.
