The danger of free-standing walls

Blog Post
Free-standing wall that has collapsed

Poorly constructed or maintained free-standing walls can be a danger. Everyone in the building industry has a responsibility to look for the dangers posed by these walls as they can cause death or injury if they collapse.

The Building Regulations do not control the construction of most free-standing walls and so you are not required to submit designs or drawings for new free-standing or retaining walls. You generally only need consent if a wall supports the foundations of a nearby building.

However, as an employer, you have a statutory duty under the Health and Safety at Work Act and other associated legislation if the construction of the wall is part of any work activity. This means you have a duty to protect anyone who may be affected by your actions.

Potential signs of danger include

  • Walls that are tall and thin, have loose bricks or different soil levels on each side.
  • A leaning wall that may or may not also show obvious signs of damage or deterioration is a potential danger.

If you build a retaining wall within 3.7m of a street, the Highways Act 1980 requires you to seek approval from the local authority. If the road is adopted you need to approach the Highway Authority, which may not be the local authority.

A sobering reminder is a company director who was responsible for a wall that collapsed onto a highway and killed a three-year old girl, received a two-year jail sentence for manslaughter in 2012.

Further information can be found in this Structural-Safety Alert: Preventing the collapse of free-standing walls. Reports on matters of concern are always sought and if you can contribute please contact Structural-Safety.org.

Comments

This shouldn't be happening

Submitted 5 years 6 months ago

All free standing walls are structures and should be adequately designed, constructed and maintained. unfortunately all to often they are seen merely as landscape items and left to the bricklayer to decide how they are built.
I recently prepared a report following the collapse of new wall being built on major developers site. The original design had been ditched because it was too costly and substituted with a wall a large free standing block wall. The wall blew over seriously injuring several workers.

This sort of thing should not be happening in the 21st century.

Many deaths

Submitted 5 years 6 months ago

Having seen so many deaths reported as a result of freestanding wall collapses I have developed some much needed and improved design guidance on the subject. I am in the process of preparing a publication which will be published in the Structural Engineer. This publication can be used by Building Control and engineers alike for assessment purposes in accordance with BS and Eurocodes. I have also recently submitted my research publication to the Brick Development Association so that they also can update their current publication on freestanding which does require some updating. Hopefully this will help to improve the poor safety record on structural safety of freestanding walls.
We also require greater political support to bring about change in Building Regulations to cover freestanding walls.
Paul Choularton - MIStructE

Webmaster note

Submitted 5 years 6 months ago

All comments posted at an earlier date to this one have been transferred from our old website.

200 year old boundary retaining wall

Submitted 3 years ago

Does a 200 year old boundary/retaining wall have a foundation on one side below ground level which is now tarmaced around the base of the remaining wall?

Reply

Submitted 3 years ago

Hello there - thanks for getting in touch.

There is no way to determine the detail or condition of a foundation without inspecting it. If you are worried about the condition of the wall you should contact a competent structural engineer or building surveyor to investigate the matter for you.

Kind regards
Trevor, LABC

High boundary wall

Submitted 1 year 11 months ago

We bought a brand new bungalow complete with new garden wall in 1985. The wall which is 1.8mts high runs alongside the public footpath. The recent high winds moved the wall outwards and the council says we must take the wall down. Our insurance company will not pay out because they say wall was poorly built. The council also says the wall was not built to standard. Should the Building Inspector have checked this out when wall was being constructed ,as the wall is next to public path ? Any advice will be very welcome, thank you…

LABC response

Submitted 1 year 11 months ago

Hi,

Thank you for your recent online question. The building regulations do not apply to independent/freestanding boundary/garden walls and, as such, these are not controlled under the building regulations. Consequently, the building inspector has no legal authority to approve or inspect such a structure. However, if a wall becomes dangerous, then the council do have the authority to require the danger to be removed under powers contained in the building act (sections 77 and 78) and could remove the danger themselves and recover any associated costs from the owner of the wall if the danger is an immediate threat or there is a delay by the owner to act on a court order to remove the danger in the interests of health and safety.

Best,
LABC team

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