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The building fabric of busy environments such as Hospitals, Schools and Commercial Buildings, is often subjected to extensive wear and tear, resulting in impact damage.  Impact damage most frequently occurs due to:  • Wheeled trolleys and chairs, such as shopping trolleys, wheelchairs and pushchairs  • Heavily laden trolleys  • Doors being opened by trolleys and/or feet • Bags/rucksacks causing surface scuffing  • Chair backs and beds impacting walls   The effects of this kind of impact damage can be minimised by carefully considering:  • Trolley routes around buildings  • Likely congestion areas  • Circulation spaces, including Choosing the right kind of impact protection for these vulnerable zones is then relatively straightforward, consider: • The optimum height for the corner guards  • The position of crashrails in relation to trolley sizes  • Do handrails also need trolley plates behind them to further protect the walls  • Is there sufficient corridor width to fix the wall protection away from the wall surface  • Whether handrails will be required to comply with the requirements of the Approved Document M  • Will impact sheet protection be required to doors and walls  • Whether the ‘duty rating’ (see page 34) of wall protection is appropriate to the type of damage anticipated  • Which material is appropriate for impact protection, e.g. rubber in delivery areas, stainless steel in kitchens, standard Acrovyn in most corridors |