'The problem is "how do you find a qualified professional?".'

I'm agreeing with you JiK... :-)

Of course you are talking about the USA... in Australia, some things are less complicated due to our differing laws, which some people (often Americans) try to dismiss as 'too intrusive' etc. :-)

However, when things go wrong here and the shit hits the fan once in a while, they then do so in a BIG way cause ALL the 'safety stops' have totally failed - eg "Dr Death" !!!

In the case of stairs in a public building such as a church - we just hire an architect - in fact you pretty well much have to to get plans approved by the local Councils under the building regs - they need to have University qualifications to call themselves that - and those qualifications can be immediately checked with the Aussie Inst of Architects - which is the only legal governing body for architects.

I agree - it CAN be useful to do some amateur research before approaching an architect - but here in OZ you don't get too fixed on some brillant amateur idea just to have the architect tell you that such a thing is legally impossible to build!

Of course such 'impossibilites' existed with things like 'adobe construction' in the early days, but most Councils have at least heard of it, and won't just stonewall you now.

Robin