Purpose – The aim of this review study is to present useful and practical expressions to compute the design vertical actions on load-bearing columns/walls of typical building structures on the basis of EN 1991: Eurocode 1.

Design/methodology/approach – It is derived by a typical case in which wind actions, snow actions and permanents actions are loading a roof construction. The results are finally used to calculate the loading on columns/walls. Both ultimate limit state and serviceability limit state are considered.

Findings – From an instructive point of view, the advantage of this method is that it is simplified, general, not time-consuming, and it can be standardised to typical building structures.

Research limitations/implications – A number of example applications are introduced to illustrate the calculation procedure.

Practical implications – From an educational point of view, this problem is of interest to civil engineering students because the reviewed method is not cumbersome or time-consuming.

Social implications – From an engineering educational point of view, this problem is of interest to civil engineering students because the reviewed method is not cumbersome or time-consuming.

Originality/value – New formulated expressions to calculate the loadings on structural membranes based on Eurocode are presented.