E49. Accessibility within your home.

In this episode of the Building Design, Prime Time podcast Frank and Amelia talk about accessibility within the home.  Frank shares a lot of personal experiences and challenges particularly when people within his own family have struggled with mobility.  
Frank and Amelia also go into some features and benefits of the Livable Housing Australia criteria and how some of these are being adopted into the National Construction Code (NCC).  

Frank also shares some projects that he has worked on that have been designed to meet Livable Housing Australia criteria.  

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About us
Prime Design is a building design company locally owned and operated in Tasmania since 2004.  Our goal is to share as much valuable information as possible about the process of building design, extensions, and more. We will talk about a different topic each week. To suggest a topic you would like us to talk about contact us at info@primedesigntas.com.au

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The information provided on this podcast is for educational and informational purposes only and is not intended to be a substitute for professional advice, individual circumstances, or remedy. We strongly suggest you consult a qualified professional before taking any action based on the information provided in this podcast. The views, opinions, and information provided in this podcast are those of the hosts do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of any other agency, organisation, employer, or company. All content provided on this podcast is provided “as is” without warranty of any kind. We make no representations as to the accuracy, completeness, currentness, suitability, or validity of any information on this podcast and will not be liable for any errors, omissions, or delays in this information or any losses, or damages arising from its use. We reserve the right to change content or delete any information provided on this podcast at any time without prior notice.

Transcript

E49. Accessibility within your home

[INTRO] (0:08 - 0:43)

Hello and welcome to the Building Design Primetime podcast, focused on providing valuable information for anyone looking to undertake a new build or extension project. We'll share our tips, tricks and stories from a building designers perspective. 

[Amelia]

Hello and welcome to the Building Design, Prime Time Podcast. I'm your host Amelia, and once again we're joined by Frank Geskus.

[Frank] (0:44 - 0:45)

Hey Amelia, how are we?

[Amelia] (0:45 - 0:46)

We just can't get rid of you.

[Frank] (0:46 - 0:52)

No, you can't get rid of me. I love doing this. I just like talking. I've been renowned for that.

[Amelia] (0:52 - 0:56)

I reckon, I reckon. I don't think you've ever said no to recording a podcast.

[Frank] (0:57 - 0:59)

When we first started this, I was very nervous.

[Amelia] (1:00 - 1:01)

Oh, I was too.

[Frank] (1:01 - 1:17)

So now I'm loving it. It's lots of fun, getting nice feedback, people learning stuff. 

[Amelia]

It's great.

[Frank]

I was actually surprised some of my colleagues and professionals listening to this as well. So it's been very nice feedback.

[Amelia] (1:17 - 1:20)

Yeah, and we've got another topic to talk about.

[Frank] (1:20 - 1:26)

We've always got a topic to talk about. We're going to talk about accessibility in residential buildings.

[Amelia] (1:26 - 1:34)

Now, this is an interesting one because this is something that, you know, we've had to have a bit of a handle on here in the office.

[Frank] (1:34 - 1:36)

Oh, for many years. Very much so.

[Amelia] (1:36 - 1:40)

Not just residential, but commercial as well. But we're going to focus on residential today.

[Frank] (1:41 - 3:49)

Yeah, but it's basically access all areas when you look at commercial. But in residential, you don't have to have access all areas. And let me explain a little bit more.

So accessibility is the term of someone with limited mobility to be able to get in and out of their house, but also to manoeuvre around their house. And that could be from an injury or a born disability. It could be a visual thing, you know, your eyesight.

But it also can come down to injury, age, all these things. I've got some great stories about injury with my wife with achilles coming into our house and that was a disaster. And you realise that having access around your house when you're immobile, getting into your bathroom, not just getting into your toilet, but actually using your toilet when you've got an injury.

Or if you're in a wheelchair, you know, that's obvious to a lot of people. You know, you go to a commercial building, you go to the shops, you go to sporting venues, all sorts of places. And they've got disability toilets.

And for obvious reasons, there are people in our communities that need these facilities. And we should not and will not discriminate in a public building. So why can't we build this into our homes?

So this is where we talk about accessibility. There was a beautiful group that put together their own type of standard and they were called Livability Housing Australia (LHA). And they put their own standard together as opposed to the Australian standards, which is AS1428.

And all you designers know all about that. And you probably cringe when you hear it. That is the one way to do it for commercial buildings.

You don't have options. With the Livable Housing Australia, you've got multiple options of different levels of accommodating people with different levels of disability. And that's been a wonderful document that's been put together.

And now part of those are going to be adopted into the building code or the National Construction Code (NCC). So what it means is it's going to be easier to get in and out of your house, getting easier to get in and out of your property, easier to get into your bedrooms, navigate around your kitchen, laundry, everything.

[Amelia] (3:49 - 3:54)

And potentially be able to live in your house for longer.

[Frank] (3:54 - 4:56)

Well, that's a great point. Because when you're older, you're not as mobile and you may have other ailments that come along and you'll be able to stay in your house longer. Because with nursing to come around to help, I had it with my own parents, where they had community nurses come around, wash, clean, do all sorts of stuff.

But the biggest restriction is like within the bathroom, you're dealing with normal showers. And like, I remember my dad, he had to have a seat. You couldn't have him stand up in the shower.

So you had to have a seat. So you're in a normal 900 by 900 cubicle with a seat. And it's plain hopeless.

You can slip, there's no handles on the walls, all these types of things. With the LHA requirements, not only it gives you the space, but it's the common sense process of, hey, within your bathroom, why don't you line the whole lot with plywood? Even though it says just block out bits, but you line that, we do line out the whole thing.

Then you tile it all as per normal or whatever you wanna, laminate panel or vinyl. And then you can bolt on handles anywhere you like. It's much better for safety.

[Amelia] (4:56 - 4:57)

Oh, definitely.

[Frank] (4:58 - 6:13)

You can pull the shower screen nice and easy. So big open space. So it's easy.

So through life, you don't know when you're gonna need this too. My wife snapped her Achilles heel at basketball. And that was like a whole year of horrible living for my wife.

You know, she tried to go to the bathroom by herself. Tiles were slippery, fell clean over. 

[Amelia]

Oh, that's awful.

[Frank]

You know, there's all sorts of stuff like that. And then she ripped that. And we had a normal towel rail. She grabbed that. Of course she would. She's about to fall.

Rip that clean off the wall. So I come tearing in and, you know, trying to sort this out. And yeah, she could have done a lot of damage to herself.

More damage. But even getting into my house was difficult because I've got two steps from my parking spot to get in. It was hopeless.

I remember my parents, the elderly, my dad in particular, trying to get into the house. There's seven steps from where you park the car all the way up to the front door. It was horrible.

And when he got really old, me and my brother had to help get him upstairs into the house. And then when he's in the house, he can shuffle around. He's got his wheelie walker and all that.

But even the furniture placement, because they had big furniture, was in the way. We had to get rid of some of the stuff so he can get his wheelie walker all the way around. Even to go to the toilet, we had to get a special seat for him.

You don't think of this until you get older. But wouldn't it be nice if you could design your house with some of these items thought of beforehand?

[Amelia] (6:13 - 6:14)

Oh, definitely.

[Frank] (6:15 - 6:43)

So we talked to some of our elderly clients. Have you considered these items? And some of them really take it up.

We use the LHA standards. It goes from bronze, silver, gold, platinum. Silver actually covers a lot of the bases.

We did a house with a developer and it was a gold slash platinum. Base came in as gold, but had some other really good features. And there was a couple that needed a specific house.

It had the sink that went up and down.

[Amelia] (6:43 - 6:44)

Yeah, that's cool.

[Frank] (6:45 - 6:59)

The hot plates went up and down. So it was all wheelchair friendly around the kitchen. That was quite extreme, but there's no reason why you can't do this.

Your biggest challenge though, when you've got to have bigger hall spaces, doorways have to be well thought of how you lay your furniture out.

[Amelia] (7:00 - 7:09)

And I guess you're referring more to new builds on this because to try and retrofit these standards would be, I imagine, very challenging.

[Frank] (7:09 - 7:44)

In certain houses, yeah. And I'll use examples of the old 60s red brick home. Very tough because the hallways are not wide enough.

The doorway positions. People don't realize how hard it is with doorways. If not positioned or swing the right way and where the handles are, it's very, very difficult.

Until you've actually been in a wheelchair and funnily enough, I had the pleasure of access consultants at a BDAA, Building Design Association, chapter meeting, and they got us to sit in wheelchairs and wheel around the building that we were in.

[Amelia] (7:44 - 7:45)

Really?

[Frank] (7:45 - 7:49)

Yeah. And you're going, wow, this is hard. It was really hard.

[Amelia] (7:49 - 7:50)

Yeah.

[Frank] (7:50 - 8:00)

In this building, it had proper accessible toilets and all that. It was still difficult. So you don't know until you're actually in that position.

Same with if you're visually impaired, it's hard to navigate this stuff.

[Amelia] (8:01 - 8:01)

Yeah, it would be.

[Frank] (8:02 - 8:38)

So there are these standards available and by Livable Housing Australia, they're wonderful. So when you're talking to your designer or architect and you're looking at house, I highly recommend you look at some of this stuff. Now, what's interesting under the National Construction Code, they're implementing some of these things as standard.

Now in Tasmania, it doesn't come in to, well, it's May right now. I think it comes in October. I believe in New South Wales, it's already in and a few other states are holding off or implementing a little bit later.

So then some of these elements have to be built into your new home mandatory.

[Amelia] (8:38 - 8:39)

Yeah, right.

[Frank] (8:39 - 8:53)

Some of it makes a lot of sense and I mentioned like bathroom design with plywood behind the walls. You don't have to do the plywood, but I highly recommend it. It's just nice and easy. You know, it's another really interesting one and we keep learning as we do this, getting your floor coverings right.

[Amelia] (8:54 - 8:56)

Yeah, so that they're what, non-slip or?

[Frank] (8:57 - 9:14)

Well, that's one part, but how about, let's say your crutches, say a wheelie walker, knee walker, all sorts of stuff, but you're rolling along and it changes from vinyl to carpet, but basically the wheels of your, or even wheelchair, come along and they can't get over the lip.

[Amelia] (9:14 - 9:15)

Yeah, okay.

[Frank] (9:15 - 9:23)

Get caught or it becomes tripping hazard. So under these standards is you can't have a greater rise in height of five millimeters.

[Amelia] (9:24 - 9:25)

That's a very small amount.

[Frank] (9:25 - 9:26)

It's not a lot.

[Amelia] (9:26 - 9:28)

That's not a lot at all.

[Frank] (9:28 - 9:42)

So then a lot of thought has to go into your floor coverings, your tiles, your carpet, your vinyl planking, whatever it may be. And so sometimes you're gonna put a little wedge under it and then it slopes it so it transitions. Imagine your front door.

How hard is it to do your front door that way?

[Amelia] (9:42 - 9:43)

Yeah, yep.

[Frank] (9:43 - 9:52)

Yet I've seen some wonderful European front doors, these specialized ones where they've got dead flat coming into the door, yet they are airtight.

[Amelia] (9:52 - 9:55)

Yeah, well, that's clever. You don't want water getting in.

[Frank] (9:55 - 9:57)

Well, no, I'm talking airtight, not watertight.

[Amelia] (9:57 - 9:57)

Oh, airtight.

[Frank] (9:58 - 10:07)

They are watertight. But they have this magnetic strip that comes down or no, it actually goes up into the door. So when the door closes, clicks up, bang, airtight.

[Amelia] (10:07 - 10:07)

That's awesome.

[Frank] (10:08 - 10:22)

Yeah, yeah. And I've seen that they're sliding doors that lift up, slide, and then they drop down and become airtight. So the technology is out there to do, just think of it, your door sill, your threshold.

Everyone's got it. They're big, chunky things.

[Amelia] (10:22 - 10:22)

Yeah.

[Frank] (10:22 - 10:38)

And the way we do them in Australia is that the door closes from the inside, close up against it and seals against it. But for someone in a wheelchair or old people that shuffle their feet or in the wheelie walker, it's a big obstacle to get over.

[Amelia] (10:38 - 10:39)

Definitely.

[Frank] (10:40 - 11:04)

So we have to put in, we call them nursing home thresholds and they're very shallow, but they don't seal very well. So then you've got cold air coming in and that's a problem from the thermal performance. So I think you'll see coming forward, better door design, better seal designs there as well.

But that means your front door, you're talking about water coming in. 

[Amelia]

Yes. 

[Frank]

You've got to put a bigger roof over your front door to protect it.

[Amelia] (11:05 - 11:05)

Yeah.

[Frank] (11:05 - 11:13)

And you have to have a minimum size circulation space, 1200 by 1200. So there's all these minimum sizes, but when you look at the house, it looks normal.

[Amelia] (11:13 - 11:21)

Yeah. And I mean, it's things that people don't often think about. I don't think either. I mean, what is the standard door? 1200 or 900? 

[Frank] (11:22 - 11:25)

Yeah. People still put in 820s. We recommend 920s.

[Amelia] (11:25 - 11:25)

Yeah.

[Frank] (11:26 - 11:32)

But that brings another interesting point. What is the clearance of your knuckles as you're going through the door?

[Amelia] (11:32 - 11:34)

Depends how big your hands are.

[Frank] (11:34 - 11:36)

Well, not really. But what if you're in a wheelchair?

[Amelia] (11:36 - 11:37)

Oh, that's a good point.

[Frank] (11:38 - 11:48)

Yeah. So you're rolling the wheels, your knuckles are exposed and you're going through a doorway. Just imagine your knuckles are going to clip the sides of the door or the doorframe.

[Amelia] (11:48 - 11:51)

Especially if you said, like you said, it was only 820.

[Frank] (11:51 - 11:52)

You won't get it through.

[Amelia] (11:53 - 11:53)

No.

[Frank] (11:53 - 12:03)

It's hopeless. So you've got to consider bigger doors. Think about your doors. Also, you've got to use lever handles as well. Makes sense. It's easier to flick the door open. You don't run knobs.

[Amelia] (12:04 - 12:04)

No.

[Frank] (12:04 - 12:18)

How you approach it. So then the door handle is central to the body when you roll to it. So you can open the door.

So if you approach a doorway, say it's 920, you enter that, basically the centre line of the door, centre line of view, you approach, you can't reach the handle.

[Amelia] (12:19 - 12:21)

No. You have to be off to the side a bit. Yeah.

[Frank] (12:21 - 12:50)

We don't realise this. We're not in that position. So a lot of consideration has to go to this. And I'd love anyone to comment on social media. Correct me on any of these items. Please, if I've got anything that is wrong.

It's just things that we've picked up over time. But it's really important to consider these things. Think of how wide your laundry is.

You need to use your laundry. So you've got to have a certain width. You've got to have the doors where the machines are positioned.

Same with your kitchen. But you know what? We need to get an expert in on this.

[Amelia] (12:50 - 12:55)

We do. That made me picture a few houses because I've been looking at properties lately.

[Frank] (12:55 - 12:56)

You're always looking at property.

[Amelia] (12:57 - 13:10)

Yeah, well, that's just me. A lot of those laundries are quite narrow. They're long and narrow. And one side might have cupboards and the other side might have a bench or there might not be enough room for cupboards on one side.

[Frank] (13:10 - 13:12)

It might be only 700, 800 mil wide.

[Amelia] (13:12 - 13:13)

Yeah, exactly.

[Frank] (13:13 - 13:15)

It's hopeless. But imagine if you're on crutches.

[Amelia] (13:15 - 13:17)

Yeah. Yeah.

[Frank] (13:17 - 13:34)

Also the slip rating, as you mentioned before. All these types of things makes living in a house difficult, especially older homes too. Because mind you, some older homes are really big.

So the space is actually really good, works well. But when you get into some of the 60s, 70s homes, it gets a bit tight.

[Amelia] (13:34 - 13:42)

I've got a question for you. How does it work if you have a two-story house? Can you still get an LHA approved?

[Frank] (13:43 - 13:43)

Yeah.

[Amelia] (13:43 - 13:44)

You can?

[Frank] (13:44 - 14:18)

Yeah, you basically put the majority of all the services on the ground floor. Now there's nothing stopping you putting a lift in either. That's true.

You know, domestic lifts, very, very common. I did it for a house. I did a renovation for my wife's uncle and he had Parkinson's.

And we got the upstairs. It was on a steep site, great view over Homer. And we got an accessible bathroom in, which was an en-suite off the main bedroom, got all the spaces to work. But getting up into that level was hard. So we ended up getting a domestic lift. So it seemed to work really well.

[Amelia] (14:18 - 14:19)

Yeah, right.

[Frank] (14:19 - 14:35)

Okay. So he had Parkinson's and that was really tough, but the house was very open plan once you got up there. We just modified the bathroom and main bedroom and built a courtyard and things like that.

Yeah. So it's also working with the individuals.

[Amelia] (14:36 - 14:37)

For their needs.

[Frank] (14:37 - 15:27)

For their needs. Some buildings are easier than others to modify. So sometimes it might be easy to build from scratch.

Mind you, you can't replace the location. 

[Amelia]

That's true.

[Frank]

So that's tough. But everyone needs to look at it from a different point too. If you go into your supermarkets, your shopping centres, your, even to an office building, and new ones, by the way, everything's designed around accessibility. You may not notice it.

There's braille on the signs. There's always an accessible toilet to use, how the carpet is, all the flooring. All these things are considered in that design because of commercial buildings from offices, shops, schools, childcare, all those types of things, churches, whatever.

They all have to consider these and you have the right to have access all areas. Should not be discriminated against.

[Amelia] (15:27 - 15:34)

Which is actually really surprising that, you know, residential homes haven't implemented some of these things sooner, really.

[Frank] (15:35 - 16:14)

In a sense, I suppose, yes. But that comes down to the people with higher pay grades in the places like the Australian Building Commission. It's up to them to make these rules, the politicians and all that. But it's coming in, you know, it's been recognised. So they're slowly bringing in stuff. This is no different to other things in building.

Mind you, I've got, as I've said before, there's some really, call it dumb shit stuff they haven't sorted with their waterproofing and condensation and stuff they haven't sorted, which blows my mind. But this type of stuff I think is very, very important and they're bringing in components into the building code. And that's why I wanna bring an expert in to talk about this a little bit more too.

[Amelia] (16:15 - 16:21)

Yeah, that'd be good. At least get a sense of the types of elements that you can implement into a home.

[Frank] (16:21 - 16:28)

Yeah, home, yeah, definitely. Steep sites are always gonna be a challenge. Two stories is always gonna be a challenge.

Split levels a bit of a...

[Amelia] (16:28 - 16:29)

Oh, that would be awful.

[Frank] (16:29 - 16:50)

Well, yes, but you can do things to deal with that. But you know what the funniest thing is? People always make comments about, oh, just put a ramp in.

Because I had this with my parents' place. Yet they don't understand. And everyone would have seen ramps in shops, shopping centres and all sorts of places.

They're not very steep.

[Amelia] (16:50 - 16:50)

No.

[Frank] (16:51 - 16:53)

You know, because they can't be.

[Amelia] (16:53 - 16:56)

No, because you can't get up or down them easily.

[Frank] (16:56 - 17:32)

Yeah, because none of us have been in a wheelchair. You try and get up a ramp, you know. It's like superhuman upper body strength if they're too steep.

So they have to be of a certain grade. And people don't understand how flat that is. And also how big the ramps are when you want to try and build one. So to do it in a house is really difficult at times. But we've done a few of them where they're really needed. But sometimes houses are really hard to do. And we're in Launceston, we're in a valley. We do work in Hobart and you know Derwent Valley there as well. And tell you what, there's a lot of steep sites.

[Amelia] (17:32 - 17:33)

Oh, definitely.

[Frank] (17:33 - 18:04)

Crazy steep sites. So you've got to pick your sites as well. But there's always...

Look, this should be a solution. We've designed accessible houses on steep sites. So the key is pick the site on the downside of the slope.

So you can enter it level. When you're going into the base of a hill, you're going to cut in and it's a lot harder. So this is just my insight on accessible homes. But I think we need to get someone in to talk about this in more detail.

[Amelia] (18:04 - 18:07)

Oh, definitely. I think we'll have to tee something up.

[Frank] (18:07 - 18:22)

Yeah. But worth considering is your house. And also if you're going to be in your house for a really long time, consider this.

I myself, I'm getting into my mid-50s. You have to consider that going forward. If you're going to be in your house for a long time, you have to consider these things.

[Amelia] (18:23 - 18:35)

100%. So what are your take-home points for anyone looking to design a more accessible house, particularly if they're unsure where to start? Do they go to an accessibility consultant or how does it work?

[Frank] (18:35 - 19:22)

Well, I think you'll find most designers and architects would know about the LHA standard. I'd be very surprised if they didn't. If not, find one that does.

But more importantly, that's actually done the course. It's all well and good, you go read the manual, but doing the course is invaluable. Most of the guys here at Prime Design have done the course. Because I felt it was really important that we need to all learn about this. So by doing the course, you understand it more than just reading a book. 

[Amelia]

Yes.

[Frank]

And it takes practice doing it too. You know, practice designing for these homes as well because there's so many things you don't realise. Classic example, you've got a hallway.

If you go to the minimum, sometimes the door handles on the doors and the robes actually encroach into the thoroughfare space and makes it non-compliant.

[Amelia] (19:22 - 19:23)

Really?

[Frank] (19:23 - 19:25)

Yeah, it's just a simple thing like a handle.

[Amelia] (19:25 - 19:27)

Yeah, you don't think about those sort of things.

[Frank] (19:27 - 19:30)

No, but you're not the person that's trying to navigate it.

[Amelia] (19:30 - 19:30)

No.

[Frank] (19:31 - 19:43)

So it's the same when I was talking about the floor coverings, how the doors work, you know, how you lay your furniture. So it's not all about size, it's about a common sense approach. And to be fair, a fair bit of experience too.

[Amelia] (19:43 - 19:47)

So come and see your building designer or architect would be your first point of contact.

[Frank] (19:47 - 20:12)

Definitely, definitely. Do your own research. Hop online, Liveability Housing Australia.

Go online, have a look at the standards. All free downloads, fantastic. But there's a lot of resources out there online to have a look at it.

But even if you want to retrofit in an existing house, that can be done too. And you can get a lot of good advice on that as well. And usually that's the case, trying to retrofit is a thing too.

You know, that's hard, but you might be able to make great improvements in the house.

[Amelia] (20:13 - 20:18)

Definitely. All right, well, we might wrap it up there, folks. Thanks for listening to the Building Design, Prime Time Podcast.

[Frank] (20:18 - 20:18)

Catch ya’s later.

[OUTRO] (20:27 - 20:31)

You're listening to the Building Design, Prime Time Podcast.