Outdoor Steps and handrail to porch

[Surftuzzer]

We’ve built a porch. Owing to the slope of our front garden we have 4 steps taking you up the 2.5m approach to the front door.

Before the porch we had a sloped path to the old front door.
The steps have 150mm rise each, except for the first one, as you step off the existing path, which has a rise of 180mm-200mm. At a glance it looks like the other 2 brick rises.

Questions:
Step - Is this likely acceptable to building control, rise as it’s the first step? The slope away gets steeper the farther from the house you go so it’s proving a challenge.
I imagine the fix would be simply to increase the slope of the existing path a tiny bit so that is an inch higher where it meets the first step.

Hand rails: is it always flagged on private dwellings, when there are 3 steps or more leading to a front door? I ask as we’ve noted some similar steps in our street with no hand rails.
We don’t want to fit one unless forced too.

Length: if we do fit one does it need to run the whole length (inc 300mm past first and last nosing)? Or just alongside the top 2 of our 4 steps.

Width: I see a rule about width of steps and hand rails both sides. Our first 3 lowest steps are each 900 wide, but the final 4th step is 1,200mm wide with 900mm going (a sort of platform at the front door rather than). Does that force us onto a double hand rail?

Its all a bit maddening as the steps take you up the garden slope, so we don’t get very high above the garden at all, even at the top.

 

[freddiemercurystwin]

Is this being done under the eyes of a Building Control Officer? Or are you just looking to comply with Building regs? A photo or two always helps ...

 

[Surftuzzer]

Is this being done under the eyes of a Building Control Officer? Or are you just looking to comply with Building regs? A photo or two always helps ...

We are doing this under the eyes of building control. The porch involved new front door/thermal foot print. This front step is the last thing for them to visit to check.

 

[freddiemercurystwin]

A photo would help as mentioned, I would expect all the steps to be identical, this is actually quite dangerous, especially as some people using the steps will be unfamiliar with them eg delivery drivers, postmen etc. But sometimes with existing buildings it's difficult to achieve even steps where they join the existing ground level but even then I would have expected your bottom step to be 140-160 if the rest are 150. Rather than 30mm off at least.

 

[Surftuzzer]

 

[Surftuzzer]

Figured out how to reduce iPhone photo size (email it to someone, Outlook offers to reduce size).

 

[big-all]

i would try an experiment by adding an extra step
place a bit off wood or similar on the path to pad out to the bottom cement line
level a slab using bricks at the front
now this will tell you iff the rise is getting more or less
if its getting more then the only way to sort properly is to shave perhaps 3-5mm off each step to bring the level down

if its getting less then perhaps 1 or2 extra steps will sort it??

 

[freddiemercurystwin]

Oh dear, what a mess, did Stevie Wonder build them? Would have been better off with a bigger landing at the top and smaller steps down, all the same size, then a handrail each side, no need to extend beyond the bottom step. You'll have to see what your inspector thinks. That said what was there before? BC can't really demand access be any better than what was there previously, that said access can't be any worse either and they may (rightfully) get a bit anxious your risers are all over the place. Hope you didn't pay someone for them.

 

[Surftuzzer]

You think hand rails both sides? Steps are 900mm wide. Top platform 1,200mm wide.

Where it meets the previous path is the only issue, perhaps photo is misleading on the rest and they actually measure ok/consistent.
I think perhaps I left the angle ever so slightly on the existing path slabs to address that 30mm.

 

[Surftuzzer]

All seems a bit petty re the height of the first step. Surely I could lay an inch of gravel on my path and voila, height is less. I won’t do that but it does all seem daft.

 

[noseall]

All seems a bit petty re the height of the first step. Surely I could lay an inch of gravel on my path and voila, height is less. I won’t do that but it does all seem daft.

Awful set up.

Big landing and say five or six, 300mm deep tread steps down to the very bottom layer. Avoid sloping slabs at all costs. Stepping (down) onto a sloping slab in the winter is not good. That bottom step looks lethal.

 

[big-all]

its to do with trip hazards
a slightly different issue in the link below but shows how very small differences can cause problems

 

[freddiemercurystwin]

I expect you'll be fine, steps with uneven risers do catch people out but whatever. I would have fitted a handrail on both sides because it's sensible.