Technical Booklet R: Access to and use of buildings.

Technical Booklet R took effect on 31 October 2012 alongside the Building Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2012. Following it gives a presumption of compliance with Part R, which can be rebutted. It covers buildings other than dwellings in Sections 2 to 6 and dwellings and blocks of dwellings in Sections 7 to 11, with an informative appendix on facilities for people with profound and multiple learning disabilities.

The booklet itself has not been reissued since 2012. Amendments Booklet AMD 8, effective 30 June 2022, added criteria for Changing Places toilets in certain buildings commonly visited by the public, for new buildings and material changes of use. Read the two together.

The booklet is clearer than most on where accessible entrance signs must be seen from: the boundary, car parking, and any principal or staff entrance that is not itself accessible. It explains LRV in plain terms in its general section and sets 30 points as the benchmark. It also notes that LRV difference matters more for a small object on a large background, such as a switch on a wall, than between two large areas. That is a helpful framing for sign panels on walls.

Lift provisions ask for raised tactile indication on or next to call buttons to identify the storey and direction of travel, with contrast between buttons, face plates and the mounting surface. Hearing enhancement systems in auditoria, larger meeting rooms and screened counters should be indicated, for example by the standard symbol.

Northern Ireland sits between two regimes. Its guidance shares much with the pre-2015 English approved document, while many projects are designed by teams more used to TGD M south of the border. Do not cite either. A sign scheme designed to BS 8300-2 will generally meet Booklet R, but submissions should reference Part R and the booklet's own paragraphs. The Disability Discrimination Act 1995 still applies in Northern Ireland, where the Equality Act 2010 largely does not.