Farm tracks and new accesses: when permission is needed

A new farm track on your own agricultural unit is usually permitted development under Part 6 of Schedule 2 to the Town and Country Planning (General Permitted Development) (England) Order 2015, provided the track is reasonably necessary for agriculture and you serve a prior notification on the council first. The point where that track meets the public road is governed by different rules. Farm track planning permission questions almost always turn out to be access questions, because forming a new junction onto a classified road is not permitted development at all.

That split matters because the two consents are granted by different bodies on different timescales. The council deals with the track. The highway authority deals with the junction, the verge and the drainage, and it can object to an application it never had to approve.

Private ways under agricultural permitted development

Part 6 divides agricultural permitted development by the size of the agricultural unit. Class A covers units of five hectares or more. Class B covers units of at least 0.4 hectares but less than five. Both classes allow the formation, alteration or replacement of a private way, which is what a farm track is in planning language.

Three conditions do the real work.

The track must be reasonably necessary for the purposes of agriculture within that unit. A track laid to serve a proposed holiday let, a wedding barn or an equestrian yard is not agricultural, whatever the field it crosses. Second, the land must be in genuine agricultural use as a unit, not a paddock detached from any farming operation. Third, before you start you must apply to the local planning authority for a determination as to whether its prior approval will be required for the siting and means of construction of the private way.

That last step is a notification, not an application for permission, and the council has 28 days to respond. If it says prior approval is not required, or says nothing within the period, you can build to the details you notified. If it says approval is required, it can control the route and the construction specification but it cannot refuse the track in principle. Many owners skip the notification because they assume permitted development means unregulated. It does not, and building first turns a straightforward notice into an enforcement conversation.

Part 6 rights are cut back on land in National Parks and the Broads and in certain adjoining areas, where more of the work falls into prior approval. Check which designation your holding sits in before you assume the standard position applies.

Where a track becomes engineering operations needing permission

Section 55 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 treats engineering operations as development. A compacted stone track laid on the existing ground profile sits comfortably within Part 6. A track that involves substantial cut and fill, retaining structures, a new culverted crossing or the import of thousands of tonnes of material starts to look like a separate engineering project rather than a private way reasonably necessary for agriculture.

Volume is the usual giveaway. So is permanence of a kind the farm does not need, such as a full-depth bound surface with kerbs on a route used twice a year. If the council forms the view that the works go beyond the class, the fallback is a full planning application supported by a Planning Statement setting out the agricultural need and the design response.

Imported material brings a second regulator. Reusing crushed concrete or road planings as a sub-base is a waste recovery activity, so you need a registered waste exemption or an environmental permit from the Environment Agency before the material arrives. Tipping first and registering later is not a defence.

New accesses onto classified roads

Part 2 of Schedule 2 permits the formation of a means of access to a highway that is not a trunk road or a classified road, where the access is needed in connection with development permitted elsewhere in the Order. Read that the other way round and the rule is blunt. A new access onto an A, B or C road, or onto a trunk road, needs express planning permission even when the track behind it does not.

But classification is not the same as the size of the road. Plenty of single-track lanes are classified C roads. Ask the highway authority, or check the definitive record, before you assume a quiet lane is unclassified.

Widening an existing agricultural gateway is a softer case. If the access already exists and is used lawfully for agriculture, improving the surface and setting the gate back is often not development at all. Moving the opening 40 metres along the frontage to get better sight lines is a new access, and the council will treat it as one.

Visibility, gates and set back

Highway authorities assess a rural access on visibility, on whether a vehicle can leave the carriageway before it stops, and on what the vehicle does to the road surface behind it.

Visibility is expressed as an x distance back from the carriageway edge and a y distance along it in both directions. Manual for Streets sets out the stopping sight distance method for lower speed roads, with 2.4 metres commonly used as the x distance in built-up situations. The Design Manual for Roads and Bridges governs the strategic road network. On a national speed limit rural road the y distances are long, and the splay usually has to cross land you control or land within the highway boundary. A splay over a neighbour's hedge is worth nothing.

Gates need to be set back far enough that the longest vehicle using the access can stand clear of the carriageway while the gate is opened. For a tractor and trailer that is considerably more than the figure used for a car, and the requirement comes from the local highway authority's own standards rather than from national policy. Ask for the standard in writing at pre-application stage and design to it.

One trap sits in the hedge. Under the Hedgerows Regulations 1997 you must serve a hedgerow removal notice on the council before removing a stretch of countryside hedgerow of 20 metres or more, or any length meeting another hedgerow at both ends. Cutting a gateway through an important hedgerow without that notice is an offence, and the visibility splay usually requires exactly that cut.

Highway authority licences for works in the verge

Planning permission does not entitle you to dig up the verge. Where the new access crosses a footway or verge, section 184 of the Highways Act 1980 requires the highway authority's consent to construct the vehicle crossing, and the authority can specify the construction and carry out the work itself at your cost. Larger alterations to the carriageway, including a widened bellmouth or a right turn facility, are usually delivered through a section 278 agreement.

Programme these early. A section 278 agreement involves technical approval, a bond and a fee, and it routinely takes longer than the planning application it sits beside.

Drainage, surfacing and run off onto the highway

A new stone track collects water and delivers it, with silt, to the lowest point. If that point is the public road, you have created a highway problem. The Highways Act 1980 makes it an offence to deposit anything on a highway that causes danger or annoyance, and mud tracked from a field gate is the most common enforcement complaint against a new agricultural access.

Design for it. A shallow reverse fall for the last 10 to 15 metres, a cattle grid or a bar drain across the entrance, a silt trap and a bound surface on the final approach will usually satisfy a highway engineer. Where the track discharges to a ditch or an ordinary watercourse, consent from the lead local flood authority may be needed for any culvert or outfall. If the scheme grows into something with a formal surface water design, a Drainage Strategy is the document that pulls the calculations together.

Evidence and drawings to submit

For a Part 6 notification, keep it short and precise: a location plan at 1:2500 showing the unit and its area, the route of the private way, a typical construction section and a note on the agricultural need.

For a planning application for a new access, expect the highway authority to want more.

1. A site location plan at 1:1250 and a block plan at 1:200 or 1:500 showing the access geometry.
2. A visibility splay drawing with x and y dimensions, the speed used to derive them and the land ownership within the splay.
3. Swept path analysis for the largest vehicle, usually an articulated grain trailer or a milk tanker.
4. Long sections showing gradients at the entrance and the transition to the carriageway.
5. A drainage detail showing interception before the highway boundary.
6. Photographs along the frontage in both directions from driver eye height.

Where the access sits in a National Landscape or opens up long views, a Landscape and Visual Impact Assessment may be proportionate, and where a track crosses better quality farmland an Agricultural Land Classification survey helps show that the route avoids the best and most versatile land.

Illustrative example: a 60 hectare arable unit wants a 300 metre stone track from an existing C road gateway to a new grain store. The track itself is Part 6 Class A with a prior notification. The gateway is being moved 25 metres east for sight lines, which makes it a new access onto a classified road and needs planning permission. The hedge removal triggers a hedgerow notice, the crossing needs section 184 consent, and the whole thing takes about four months if the highway standards are agreed at the start.

This is general guidance, not legal advice. Check the position with your local planning authority and highway authority, or a qualified professional, before relying on it. A lawful development certificate is the only formal way to confirm that works are lawful.

Start with the route and the junction together rather than in sequence. Enter your postcode on PlanScope to see which reports a rural access scheme is likely to need.

PlanScope provides AI-assisted draft reports for planning applications. Reports should be reviewed before submission. We do not guarantee planning approval.