SPAB Magazine Winter 2024

In the Winter 2024 edition of the SPAB Magazine, SPAB chief executive Matthew Slocombe highlights an issue that might concern heritage practitioners, arising in parallel with the revision of the National Planning Policy Framework. The text of the NPPF’s heritage section remains unchanged but the government has taken the opportunity once again to ask about application fees. Although no fees are currently levied for submitting a scheme for a listed building, the SPAB has responded that such fees could act as an additional burden on owners and a deterrent to seeking consent; but that if a reasonable fee could ensure a speedy, well-informed decision, and revenue could be fenced in law for conservation advice, there might be a general benefit in such a change. It will be interesting to note the response of other heritage bodies and the outcome of this enquiry in due course.

The Winter issue particularly concentrates on the climate crisis and how historic buildings can manage, adapt and recover from the impact of water. It identifies a number of aspects required to understand the heritage impact of flooding; reports on how climate-change analysis modelling is being used; and discusses the impact of supersaturation of structures, and how this can lead to failures. An instructive case example is given by Ed Morton, an eminent CARE structural engineer, involving the Grade I Lincoln Castle, whose banks are designated as a scheduled ancient monument. Morton discusses how problems of water saturation can be mitigated.

A further article looks at protecting and adapting historic buildings for 21st-century levels of rainfall, noting that there are equal and opposite problems arising from prolonged periods of dry weather.

This article originally appeared in the Institute of Historic Building Conservation’s (IHBC’s) Context 183, published in March 2025.

--Institute of Historic Building Conservation