Instructions have to be shouted and still are not followed
A sports hall you cannot teach in
A big box with a hard floor, blockwork walls and a metal deck roof. Sports halls are usually the worst-sounding rooms in a school, and the people who suffer most are the staff who have to make themselves heard in them all day.
The warning signs
- Instructions have to be shouted and still are not followed
- Staff finish the day hoarse
- Whistles and impacts are painfully loud
- Assemblies and exams in the hall are barely workable
Why the hall plays against you
The room is very large, so there is a great deal of air holding energy, and nearly every surface returns it.
Blockwork and metal deck absorb very little, so a shout keeps circulating for several seconds.
And because the hall has to take balls and equipment, the soft materials that would fix it cannot go just anywhere — which is exactly why sports halls get left alone.
The league table of fixes
BB93 sets the sports-hall limit by floor area (Table 7): 1.5 s under 280 m², rising on a sliding scale to 2.0 s above 530 m². Meeting BB93 is the normal way of satisfying Requirement E4 of the Building Regulations. Many existing halls measure well over three.
- 1about 300 m²Impact-resistant wall panels above ball height
The standard answer. Above roughly 2.5 m the panels are out of harm's way.
- 2about 380 m²Absorbent liner to the roof deck
Very effective, because the deck is the largest surface — but access decides it.
- 3about 260 m²Suspended ceiling rafts
Used where the roof cannot be lined; needs coordinating with lighting and nets.
- 4about 120 m²Retractable curtains, or divider nets with fabric
Partial, but it doubles as the court divider you may want anyway.
Indicative figures for the example room (33 × 18 × 7.5 m, about 4,455 m³), from the same method the report uses. Your room will differ, which is the point of checking it.
Post-match questions
Will panels survive being hit by a ball?+
Impact-resistant systems exist for exactly this and are what specifiers use. Standard fabric-faced panels will not last, which is why the usual approach is to treat above ball height.
Is this a BB93 compliance job?+
It can be, and if it is you will need a measured survey to confirm it. Our figure is indicative and meant for deciding what to do and roughly how much of it — a design guide, not a compliance measurement.
Our hall is also used for exams and assemblies. Does that change the target?+
Yes. A hall doing double duty for speech wants to be nearer the speech end of the range, which means more absorption rather than less. Tell the tool what the room is really used for.