Dropped kerb application or planning permission: which one

A dropped kerb and planning permission answer different questions. The dropped kerb, properly a vehicle crossing or footway crossing, is a highways consent under section 184 of the Highways Act 1980, and it decides whether the council will let you drive across the public footway. Planning permission decides whether you may form a new access and lay a driveway in your front garden, and whether that is acceptable in planning terms. You can hold one and be refused the other.

Which you need depends mostly on one fact: whether the road is classified.

What a vehicle crossing application decides

The footway outside your boundary is public highway. Driving a car across a footway built for pedestrians damages it, so section 184 gives the highway authority control over the construction of a crossing and over who builds it. An application is made to the highway authority, which on a two-tier arrangement is the county council rather than the district that handles planning.

The authority considers road safety and the practical engineering. Visibility in both directions. Gradient between the carriageway and the property. Proximity to a junction, a pedestrian crossing, a bus stop or a traffic island. Whether a lamp column, gully, telecoms chamber or street tree sits in the way. Whether the crossing width is adequate for a vehicle to turn in and out without a three-point turn in the road.

If it agrees, the authority or an approved contractor constructs the crossing, strengthening the footway construction to take vehicle loads, and you pay. Nobody else may dig in the highway. The first thing worth establishing is which highway authority you are dealing with, because an access near a trunk road brings a different body into it.

When planning permission is also needed

Part 2 Class B of the General Permitted Development Order 2015 permits the formation of a means of access to a highway, where that access is required in connection with development permitted by another class, and where the highway is not a trunk road or a classified road.

So the position runs like this:

Three further triggers for a planning application regardless of the road class. A listed building, where works within the curtilage affecting its setting or fabric may need listed building consent. An article 4 direction withdrawing Part 1 and Part 2 rights, which many councils have made over areas with consistent front boundary treatments. And the removal of a boundary wall over one metre high next to a highway, which is itself development outside the Part 2 Class A allowance.

Where permission is needed, a short Planning Statement dealing with the access, visibility and surfacing is normally enough for a householder application. On a classified road the highway officer will want visibility splays drawn to the relevant standard and a note on the swept path, which a brief Transport Statement covers without needing a full assessment.

Classified roads and the limit that catches people

The classification question causes more wasted drawings than anything else in this subject. Classification is an administrative status held by the highway authority. It does not track traffic volume, width or appearance. Quiet residential streets are sometimes classified C-roads, and busy-looking estate roads are often unclassified.

Ask the highway authority directly and get the answer in writing. One email saves the cost of a planning application you did not need, or the embarrassment of building an access that required one.

Note: a trunk road access engages National Highways rather than the local authority, and the approach to those is considerably more restrictive.

Surfacing, drainage and permeable paving

Part 1 Class F permits a hard surface within the curtilage of a house for a purpose incidental to its enjoyment. The condition that matters sits on front gardens: where the surface is between the principal elevation and the highway, it must be made of porous material, or provision must be made to direct run-off to a permeable or porous area within the curtilage.

That rule exists because paving front gardens with impermeable block and draining them to the street pushed surface water into drainage systems that could not take it. It is not optional, and it is one of the breaches councils do act on, usually after a neighbour's garage floods.

Workable solutions:

1. Permeable block paving on a free-draining sub-base, with no connection to the highway drain.
2. Gravel over a geotextile and a stone sub-base, with an edge restraint.
3. Impermeable paving laid to fall towards a soakaway, a rain garden or a planted border inside the boundary.
4. Two concrete wheel strips with a permeable strip between them, which also keeps more planting.

Falls matter as much as materials. A permeable surface laid to fall towards the footway will still discharge to the highway once the sub-base saturates, and the highway authority will object to that at the crossing stage.

Visibility, gradient and crossing width

Visibility is judged on the sight line from a driver at the back of the footway along the carriageway in each direction, measured against the speed of the road. Hedges, walls over about 600 mm, parked cars in a permanent bay and street furniture all cut into it. Where the splay crosses a neighbour's land that you cannot control, the authority will treat it as unavailable.

Gradient is the quieter problem. A property raised above the carriageway, or dropping away from it, needs a transition within the frontage depth, and a short frontage with a significant level change cannot be resolved without excavation or a ramp that grounds the car. Measure it before you plan anything.

Crossing width is usually set by the authority rather than by you, and a standard domestic crossing is a modest width. Wider crossings serving two vehicles are sometimes agreed where the frontage is long and the road quiet. Turning space within the plot is what the authority really cares about, because a vehicle that has to reverse onto a classified road has achieved nothing for safety.

Fees, timescales and sequence

Both consents carry fees. The planning fee for a householder application is set nationally and indexed annually, so check the current schedule. The section 184 charge is set locally, covers inspection and construction, and varies widely depending on what has to be moved, so ask for a quotation rather than assuming a figure.

On timing, a householder planning application has an eight week determination period. A crossing application has no statutory period and commonly takes several weeks for assessment and longer for the works to be programmed, particularly where a service diversion is involved.

The sensible order:

1. Ask the highway authority whether the road is classified and whether a crossing is likely to be acceptable in principle, with an informal site check if offered.
2. If permission is needed, apply for it, with the visibility and drainage detail already agreed informally with the highway officer.
3. Apply for the section 184 crossing once permission is granted or once it is clear none is needed.
4. Lay the driveway, with the drainage arrangement built as drawn.
5. Have the crossing constructed by the authority or its approved contractor.

Running the highway enquiry first is the step people skip. The highway authority has the narrower discretion and the firmer standards, and there is no point holding a planning permission for an access it will never allow you to reach.

If you want to know what else your frontage works might attract, you can check what your postcode attracts against the mapped constraints before you commission drawings.

This is general guidance, not legal advice; check the position with your local planning authority or a qualified professional before relying on it. A Lawful Development Certificate is the only formal way to confirm that works are lawful. PlanScope provides AI-assisted draft reports for planning applications. Reports should be reviewed before submission. We do not guarantee planning approval.