Building Connection Spring 2018

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Simply put,
surface materials
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falls.
Rebecca Findlay-Debeck
is Managing Director of
Slip Assessment Services
(www.slipassessment.
com), an independent slip
safety consultancy.
design and human factors that
contribute to slip and fall risks.
Elements that impact pedestrian safety
include: flooring materials; surface
treatment, cleaning and maintenance;
lighting/visibility; design; exposure to
climatic conditions; footwear; levels of
pedestrian attention… the list goes on.
So why the focus on surface materials
and finishes in the BCA and Australian
Standards?
Simply put, surface materials
and flooring finishes are the most
statistically significant factor in causing
slip and falls. The US National Floor
Safety Institute (NFSI) estimates that
55% of all slip and falls are attributable
to hazardous surface material/finishes.3
This finding has been mirrored in the
research of SafeWork Australia and the
UK national Health Service Executive
(HSE), who believe that more than
50% of workplace slip and falls can be
prevented through effective flooring
design and other controls.4
At this point you might be wondering
why it took until 2014 to adopt slip
safety requirements? It didn’t. Slip
safety standards have always formed
part of the BCA for stairs, ramps and
landings. If we refer as far back to the
BCA 1990, we see that ‘non-slip’ and
‘slip resistant’ surfaces have been a
requirement for building certification
for more than two decades.5
In fact, provisions in the 1990 BCA
for the ACT extended the requirement
for ‘non-slip finishes’ to all paving and
flooring surfaces in public areas — such
as colonnades, arcades and entrance
lobbies — and around swimming pools.6
Similarly, Queensland’s and
Tasmania’s BCAs adopted extensive
provisions requiring floor surfaces to
be ‘designed to prevent slips, trips
and falls’ with an even slip resistant
surface.7
So what were the 2014 slip resistance
changes about? Quantification and
specification. Previously, the BCA
references focused on creating ‘slip
resistant surfaces’ and ‘preventing slips
and falls’. What these objectives meant
in practice was open to interpretation,
leaving builders uncertain as to
just what was needed to achieve
compliance.
The 2014 amendments changed this
— creating a direct link between the BCA
and the Slip Resistance Values (SRVs)
and classifications identified under the
Australian Standards, AS4586-2013,
Slip Classification
of New Pedestrian
Surfaces and its
related Handbook,
HB198:2014 Guide
to the Specification
and Testing of
Slip resistance of
Pedestrian Surfaces.
The slip safety
compliance tables
included within
the 2014 and later
BCAs8 mirror the
more comprehensive
provisions under
AS4586-2013 and
HB198:2014.
Importantly, the 2014 amendments
made slip safety compliance mandatory
for stairs (treads/nosings), ramps
and landings — linking requirements
to specific SRV results under the
Australian Standards. These results
are then grouped in the standards
into classification bandwidths such
as P3, P4 and P5 (wet pendulum
resistance testing); or R9, R10 and
R11 (laboratory-based ramp testing).
For example, a 39SRV would equal a P3
classification, while a 26SRV would be
a P2.
What this means in practice, is that
you can no longer deem slip safety
compliance by a ‘guesstimate’ based
on the materials you’ve used. While you
might think your cove-finish concrete
can ‘stop an elephant’, unless it has
been tested for slip safety, you can’t
tell what SRV it actually achieves —
therefore your certifying authority can’t
determine whether the surface meets
the classifications required under the
BCA. This becomes more complex when
you factor in slope and temperature
adjustments to testing results/SRVs
required under Australian Standards.
In short, mandatory slip safety
testing means just that — it’s
mandatory. Whether the testing is
done by you or your product supplier,
an Australian Standards compliant
certificate is required for the surface
materials used on all stairs, ramps
and landings … and for some of these
materials (such as poured concrete and
broadcast epoxies), testing can only be
done on-site.
Moving forward,
do the proposed May
2019 amendments
change anything?
No, this version of
the BCA not only
maintains the
existing slip safety
provisions, it extends
them — now including
swimming pool entry
areas and accessible
adult changing
rooms/facilities.
What does this mean
for your building site?
Well, like emoji’s and bottled water, slip
safety in the construction industry is
here to stay.
Next article we’ll explore slip safety
testing and certification, as well as
some common mistakes when applying
slip safety principles to your building
site.
1 Current and historical data (workers compensation
based) available from
australia-2017 (retrieved April 14, 2019). See also:
falls and .nsf/
mf/6324.0
2 Liberty Mutual Institute for Safety. 2016.
From Research to Reality: Fall Injuries Inevitable or
Preventable (retrieved March 1, 2017) (https://www.
research-institute-site/Documents/FallInjuries.pdf).
3 National Floor Safety Institute (NFSI). 2017. Untitled
video [home page] (retrieved March 1, 2017) (https://
).
4 For research, data, case studies etc, see: http://www.
5 BCA 1990 V1: D2.10, D2.13 and D2.14, for example.
6 BCA 1990 ACT D2.103; G1.1.
7 BCA 1990: Qld H101.3; H101.5; Tas H101.3; Tas
H105.12; Tas H106.5.
8 NCC2016-BCAV1 D2.14 (Building Classes 2-9;
including sole occupancy Class 3) and V2 3.9.1.3 (Building
Classes 1 and 10). See also NCC2016-BCA Guide, V1, V2:
DP2(c); D2.10; D2.13; D2.14); G4.7 (Alpine Areas); TAS
H123 P3; and V2 P2.5.1 + 3.9.1.4 (Building Classes 1 and
10).