Industry Guidance for the Planning, Design, Construction and Maintenance of Tall Buildings

Industry Guidance for the Planning, Design, Construction and Maintenance of Tall Buildings is aimed at all parties in the construction supply chain that are involved with the procurement, design, planning, construction, and maintenance of tall buildings.

The construction of tall buildings creates additional health and safety issues to those encountered during construction of lower rise and lower risk structures. While many of the hazards may be similar, the risks and challenges can change with the increasing height and complexity of the building.

With the number of tall buildings within Great Britain increasing rapidly and construction techniques developing all the time, there is concern that clients (such as developers) may not have access to sufficient quality knowledge specific to the planning, design, construction and maintenance of such structures. Clients may also not have ready access to advisors, designers and contractors with the skills, experience and knowledge to help them.

It assumes those using it have a general knowledge and understanding of the health and safety system within Great Britain and of how to plan, manage and monitor health and safety during conventional lower rise and lower risk construction work.

The guidance follows a ‘risk management approach’ to identify hazards and provide solutions to enable the design and safe construction of tall buildings. Solutions are presented in the form of case studies that show how the topic has been approached and dealt with by those experienced in this field. It does not tell you what to do, as each situation must be assessed on its own merits, but it does give examples of planning, systems and controls that have been adopted by others who are experienced in this work. It is written following the principal that it is to be used for building buildings safely and not building safer buildings.

Important Note: It must be emphasised that this guidance has been written by those in the design and construction industry to address issues around the “significant and foreseeable risks” associated with the design, construction, in-use and maintenance phases in the life of a tall building. It does not cover issues relating to “normal or routine risks” with all these phases under the CDM Regulations, planning legislation, normative Building Regulations or the Building Safety Act.