About Richard Anthony Johnson
Experienced, passionate engineer

A Consulting Civil and Structural Engineer, practicing in the Fens, North Cambridge, Norfolk and Lincolnshire. I've specialised in residential propeties, particularly traditional structures and seem to do a lot of Barn conversions and victorian/ georgian propeties- probably because of being based in prime farmland, which historically would have been wealthy during the 19th and early 20th century.
Personal favourites include designing for the older buildings, particularly restorations or conversions. Having had hands on experience, I've got good grounding in NHL, putty and slaked limes, their uses in mortars, renders and plasters. I have a good understanding of breathabillity, cold bridging and structures with solid masonry walls, have extensive experience in underpinning works, preventing differential settlement due to structural alterations and determining the root cause of movement in buildngs. I'm experienced in designing with timber for beams, columns, posts, floor joists, rafters, stud walls and racking walls. I've designed oak King Post, Queen and Fan trusses, hand cut purlin roofs (even resolving forces correctly!) and lots of roofs for Orangeries.
I know my way around structural steelwork design, inluding their connections, welding, grade strengths and finishes. I've managed to produce structural designs for historic buildings in and around the Fens, working in Wisbech, Downham Market and Kings Lynn. I've even worked breifly on The Bishop's Palace at Ely cathedral. Currently, Im consulting on a project for a 13th century Church over near Huntingdon.
My background includes post graduate specialism in Concete and I design raft foundations, beams columns, slabs and piled foundations. The great thing about the Fens is that there's no true bedrock so piled foundations have to be skin friction, rather than end bearing.
The bad side about the fens is the poor soil conditions- it used to be marshland and before that, an estuary- or the inlet to the sea at least! That mans that pretty much every project needs a geotechnical survey so I've become quite conversant at geology over the years and have a good grounding in foundations, shrinkable soils, volume change potential, Atterberg limits (Pasticity index), sulphates in CLAYs and building on PEAT. Specifying the type of foundations and the grade concete for the foundations is pretty straight forward once all those aspects are known.
Featured articles and news
Great British Energy install solar on school and NHS sites
200 schools and 200 NHS sites to get solar systems as first project of the newly formed Labout government initiative.
The restoration of the novelist’s birthplace in Eastwood.
Life Critical Fire Safety External Wall System LCFS EWS
Breaking down what is meant by this now often used term.
PAC report on the Remediation of Dangerous Cladding
Recommendations on workforce, transparency, support, insurance, funding, fraud and mismanagement.
New towns, expanded settlements and housing delivery
Modular inquiry asks if new towns and expanded settlements are an effective means of delivering housing.
Building Engineering Business Survey Q1 2025
Survey shows growth remains flat as skill shortages and volatile pricing persist.
Construction contract awards remain buoyant
Infrastructure up but residential struggles.
Home builders call for suspension of Building Safety Levy
HBF with over 100 home builders write to the Chancellor.
CIOB Apprentice of the Year 2024/2025
CIOB names James Monk a quantity surveyor from Cambridge as the winner.
Warm Homes Plan and existing energy bill support policies
Breaking down what existing policies are and what they do.
Treasury responds to sector submission on Warm Homes
Trade associations call on Government to make good on manifesto pledge for the upgrading of 5 million homes.
A tour through Robotic Installation Systems for Elevators, Innovation Labs, MetaCore and PORT tech.
A dynamic brand built for impact stitched into BSRIA’s building fabric.
BS 9991:2024 and the recently published CLC advisory note
Fire safety in the design, management and use of residential buildings. Code of practice.