Although Building Regulations have changed over the years, much of the basic structural parts are essentially the same - ie that walls and foundations are adequate and safe for the loading.
So to prove that a wall or foundation will be safe, then could I just point out a few properties from the early part of the century which have been built a certain way and are still as sound today as when built?
Why can't such an example be used as proof that a particular construction method will be adequate and safe for then next 100 years and thus comply with the Building Act?
"...Why can't such an example be used as proof that a particular construction method will be adequate and safe for the next 100 years and thus comply with the Building Act?"
I'm no expert on the topic, but isn't it all to do with changing standards. You could try to argue that the standards to which a 100 year-old building was originally built are 'adequate', but they just won't meet the current requirements. Take building insulation, for example and think about what you got with a 100 year-old building compared it with today's requirements.
I thinking purely structural, and basic construction methods
Some examples - extension foundations twice as wide and three times as deep as the house being built on to, opening sizes and locations within a wall, timber [oak] lintels. These are but a few.
Because it won't comply with today's building regulations. I've worked on lots of houses where there are 3 courses of brick below ground and no concrete (the houses were built straight up off the soil) and the extensions we built had to have strip footings 3 feet deep and two feet wide at the bottom, 8 inches of concrete and a cavity wall built up to DPC, then the cavity filled with concrete prior to backfill. Attempting to reason with them that the house has been there for 100 or 150 years will do no good at all, they can't make you change the footings for the original buildings, just the ones that are going up now.
Because it isn't proof that a particular construction method will be adequate and safe. It is merely evidence that that particular house has stayed standing, not that all houses built with that technique are structurally sound. They weren't; the unsound ones have fallen down or been demolished, and those standing may have had extensive repair work.
The Leaning Tower of Pisa is not an example to follow.
However, if your structural engineer can show by calculation that whatever you're proposing is no less safe than the Approved Documents then the council should accept that as being complying with the Regs. You can, for example, have a Tudor style oak post and beam house if you want to.
Why would it not comply? Remember that the Approved Documents are just examples and not the only way of meeting the requirements of the Building Regulations and Building Act. Nowhere in the regulations does it state specific dimensions
For example from Part A "Loading A1. (1) The building shall be constructed so that the combined dead, imposed and wind loads are sustained and transmitted by it to the ground - (a) safely; and (b) without causing such deflection or deformation of any part of the building, or such movement of the ground, as will impair the stability of any part of another building.
Thats the basics, and then we have the Approved Documents which give, just one acceptable method of achieving this.
So if a building from constructed 100 years ago on shallow foundations and with slender walls has conformed with the above statement (by virtue of it not deflecting, deforming and is safe and stable), then why can't a similar construction be accepted today as conforming to the building regulations?
If it went to court, and the LA tried to prove that the construction used did not meet the build regulations, then surely evidence of 1000s of houses of similar construction to that used being perfectly stable etc, would be proof enough that the construction method used met the requirements of the building regulations?
No, because they're often pig-ignorant pen-pushers with little in the way of qualification or ability. Approve something for which instructions and *pictures* are not available? Never!
Extensive oak and softwood frame. BUT they wanted it checked by structural engineers, and it ended up bolted together in many places...and with bits of hidden steel.
The slender walls you might get away with, but the foundations not..the issues with subsidence are key here.
IF you have an ideal structure, get a structural engineer to calculate it and 'prove' to the BCO that its adequate. The BCO has his arse covered, and will go along OK.
Its no use whining that the regulations are over fancy, and the BCO is thick. Those are givens. You have to work with reality, not change it so make your life easier. Changing reality is a very complex and labour intensive process ;-)
No. It would not.
Only a structural engineers report is of any real weight in such matters.
IF your structural engineer looks at a 500 year old house and finds that 'Yes, its strong enough and stiff enough to meet requirements, then all well and good..if he comes back and says 'the only reason that house is still standing is that massive brick chimney that was added in 1700, and its stopped the whole house from slewing over, and unless you are prepared to replicate that, your design will, too,' then you have a problem.
The devil is in the detail. 500 years ago floors that moved up and down an inch were common. Today its unacceptable. And if you decide to mount e.g. a 700 liter (3/4 tonne) hot water cylinder on them, downright dangerous.
Modern houses have to be STIFF as well as strong. They are NOT the same thing.
A block of polystyrene blue foam is stiff, but not strong, a car leaf spring is strong, but not stiff.
My Edwardian terrace has a doorway or two like that, on the rear "extension" bit. The BCO didn't mind us building a loft conversion on top without so much as investigating the footings. Half the houses in our street have been converted without problem, so they have our street down as not requiring foundation investigation.
Like most houses built a long time ago... if they are still standing it is a good sign that they will continue standing for another hundred years or so.
Modern constructions tend to be ephemeral. Witness 60s tower blocks being knocked down these days whereas centuries old tenements in the Old Town in Edinburgh are going strong.
More than anything as a complete waste of time and money was the 'millenium dome'... most past governments would have created something lasting which would still be there in 400 years, not something based on plastic which falls apart after a few years.
It sums up the current and recent governments. If a monument is going to be built to mark the new millenium, why not build something that will still be there for the next millenium! The Egyptians, Greeks and Romans managed it. As did most of the cathedral builders in Mediaeval Europe even if their constructions took many years or centuries to complete.
Who in a hundred years will even know about the 'Millenium Dome' but will instead marvel at Koeln Cathedral and even climb the many steps to hear the bells ring at first hand and then after their ears have recovered wander into that marvellous bar Frueh am Dom to enjoy several glasses of koelsch.
On Fri, 19 May 2006 14:37:53 GMT, a particular chimpanzee named snipped-for-privacy@white-eagle.invalid.uk randomly hit the keyboard and produced:
Tower blocks are mostly being knocked down for reasons other than structural failure. They have their physical problems (leaking windows, poor insulation, etc), but the frame would probably last centuries if looked after. In Liverpool, and probably many other cities, these tower blocks were built on the cleared sites of old Georgian and Victorian houses and tenements.
On 18 May 2006 13:53:16 -0700, a particular chimpanzee named "dg" randomly hit the keyboard and produced:
Changes in Regulations and guidance often come about due to failures. Something happens, and the cry goes up, "we must do something"! Other times change happens due to research and greater awareness of potential problems.
WRT the walls, floors, roof structure, etc., there's no reason why you can't follow the basic principle used in Victorian or Georgian building, provided what you do meets modern-day requirements.
The reason why walls are no longer built in 9" solid brickwork is for the reasons that cavities were introduced into walls in the first place, to prevent damp penetration through solid masonry. This has been later used as a place to fit insulation. You could have solid walls with internal insulation and external render.
Much of the timber to build the floors and roofs of houses before the industrial age was from local woodland, and was slow-growing, strong softwood, if not hardwood, left to season. Much of the modern day timber in your local builder's merchants is forced softwood, cut and shipped before it's even dry.
Much of the skills used to build older properties are no longer there. These days, a joiner is someone who nails trusses to a wall plate; a plasterer is someone who tapes and skims joints in plasterboard. Do plumbers still do lead flashings?
As a result of droughts and insurance claims, a whole industry has grown up around making sure that foundations are dug to minimum depths in clay soils and outside the influence of any shrinkage or heave caused by trees. Who was there to sue 100 years ago when the house you'd just built started settling due to shrinkage?
To compare buildings built over a century ago to virtually anything you could build today is to compare apples and oranges. Also, two wrongs don't make a right.
Which is another worrying problem. People's houses are being compulsory purchased so that developer can move in and build wonderful skyrise flats... can the original owners buy one... no... not because of any legal restriction, but simply because the money from the purchase of their original house will not allow them to buy a place anywhere, let alone where they used to live.
It is basically a situation of 'I own this ground', 'Piss off I have money and want to take your property, so hard luck'.
Or the Prescott iniative as is found here where a local council is seeking to demolish 1500 houses....
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"Gresham ward councillor Ken Walker, a leading critic of the demolition proposal, said the council's proposals were seriously flawed.
He said if they were approved on Friday by Cllr Dave Budd, Executive councillor for regeneration, as a basis for consultation he would seek the issues to be called in under the council's scrutiny process.
He said: "If a resident with a house with a market value of £45,000 wanted to purchase a property for £80,000 I believe the funding figures will be - Purchase price of new home £80,000, existing house price £45000, home loss contribution £4,500, OHRAS payment £15,000 leaving a shortfall of £15,500 which would need to be found by the home-owner."
"This is a so-called housing renewal scheme that will force residents out of perfectly good sound property," said Cllr Walker."
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