Tactile Nosings for Precast Concrete Stair Treads and Steps

Commercial and institutional stair installations often require tactile nosings on concrete steps or stair treads. The purpose of a tactile warning strip is to assist vision impaired people in navigating stairs.

While you should check your local building code, often sandblasted strip or troweled nosing at the leading edge of the stair tread will suffice for this tactile strip.

The purpose of the strip is to provide both a visual and a tactile edging that can be seen and felt. If you can’t see the nosing, you should still be able to feel it with your foot or a cane.

Carborundum Nosing Can Be Cast Into Precast Concrete stair Treads

In high traffic areas such as public transit such as Greater Vancouver’s Skytrain stations, the nosings may be required to be more visual.

Carborundum, an abrasive and durable material is mixed with epoxy and cast into extruded aluminum rails which can be cast into precast concrete stair treads.

Caborundum nosings are typically black, however, coloured carborundum nosings are also available.

Yellow nosings are typical in public transit areas, while blue makes a nice contrasting edging to a grey broom finished precast concrete step.

Nosing details can be troweled into the concrete stair treads or sandblasted

Tactile nosings do not need to be cast in carborundum. Carborundum nosings are expensive, yet a tactile nosing can still be achieved with a special trowel or a sandblasted strip. The trowel creates a radius on the leading edge as well as four distinct notches that can be clearly seen as well as felt.

Trowelled in tactile grooves can be done in light sandblast stair treads as well as broom finish and exposed aggregate stair treads.

Sanderson Concrete can also sandblast a distinct strip into the front edge of our precast treads. This strip exposes a little more of the aggregate creating both a visual and tactile strip that is often preferred to a cast in carborundum nosing strip.

Sanderson Concrete produces thousands of stair treads annually. From standard precast treads to custom stair treads – we are the largest producer of precast concrete steps and stair treads on the West Coast. For more info on our stair tread capabilities or our landscape treads, visit our stair tread pages.

Looking for more information on precast concrete stair treads or nosings?

• Email us today, for a quote

Or check out our other resources:

• New Set of Stairs in a Day
• Ready Mix Concrete vs Precast Concrete Stairs
• Precast concrete stair treads
• Landscape steps