Building a Home for Life

Building in future-generation-friendly standards is not as onerous as we’ve been led to believe - Mark Brinkley examines the benefits of building according to the 16 lifetime standards rules.

Building a Home for Life

ABOVE: This oak framed self-build serves three generation of the same family. Read more about this self-build...

Do you know what a Lifetime Home is? It’s a set of 16 standards intended to make homes readily adaptable for disabled users. The Lifetime Homes Standard been around since 1991, having originally been developed by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation. Some of the standards got incorporated into the Building Regulations in 1999, under Part M in England and Wales. And in February 2008, the Government announced that it wanted to introduce the full set of standards to all new housing after 2013. The standards are shown below.

Whilst many people bridle at the thought of being told how their house should be designed, most of these steps are easily incorporated into a new house and cost either very little or nothing at all. They really only become difficult to incorporate in smaller homes, where some of the space requirements become hard to meet — in particular the requirement for a downstairs bathroom to be capable of adaptation for wheelchair users, plus the requirement for a shower drain in the downstairs bathroom.

What we can anticipate is that these measures will be incorporated into Part M of the England and Wales Building Regulations over the next few years. Part M as it currently exists calls for features such as level thresholds for the entrance door, wider doorways and restrictions on socket and switch heights. Note the subtle difference here: Lifetime Homes is requesting that not only electrical switches and sockets are placed between 450mm and 1,200mm above floor level, but also heating controls, radiator valves, ventilation levers, stop taps and window handles. Is that an appalling nanny-like interference with our liberties? Or just plain common sense? Why should you have to rummage around under the kitchen sink searching for a stop tap which is quite likely to be jammed, when there are ingenious and cheap products out there which allow you to isolate the mains water with the flick of a switch?*

Whatever you feel about having to build disabled-friendly homes in future, it would be wise to take on board the thinking behind it all, because if you design it in from the outset, there is very little added cost. On the other hand, adapting an existing house to Lifetime Homes standards is expensive and extremely disruptive.

Lifetime Homes Standards
  • Car parking space should be easily capable of enlargement to attain a width of 3,300mm
  • The distance from the car parking space to the home should be kept to a minimum and should be level or gently sloping
  • The approach to all entrances should be level or gently sloping
  • Entrances should be illuminated and the main entrance covered
  • Communal stairs should provide easy access and where levels are reached by lift, the lift should be fully wheelchair accessible
  • Doorways and hallways have to be at least 750mm wide, or at least 900mm wide when the approach is head on
  • Living areas should have space for turning a wheelchair and there should be adequate circulation space for wheelchair users
  • The living space should be at the level of the entrance
  • In homes of two or more storeys, there should be space at entrance level which could be used as a convenient bed space
  • There should be a WC at the entrance level of the property and, in larger properties, there should be drainage provision enabling a shower to be fitted in the future
  • The design of the property should provide for a reasonable route for a potential hoist from a main bedroom to the bathroom
  • The design of the property should incorporate a provision for a future stairlift and a suitably identified space for a through-thefloor lift from the ground to the first floor
  • Walls in the bathrooms should be capable of taking adaptations
  • The bathroom should be designed to incorporate ease of access to essential amenities such as the bath, basin and WC
  • Living room windows should begin 800mm from the floor or lower and be easy to open
  • Switches, sockets, ventilation and service controls should be situated between 450mm and 1,200mm from the floor

 

* This product is called Surestop: surestop.co.uk  

 

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Author
Mark Brinkley
Issue date:
June 2008
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