How to get planning permission for a caravan storage site

Storing touring caravans on a field is a material change of use under section 55 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990, and it needs planning permission. It is not a caravan site in the licensing sense, because nobody lives in the caravans, so the Caravan Sites and Control of Development Act 1960 site licence regime does not bite. What it is, in planning terms, is open storage in the countryside, and that is a use planning policy treats with suspicion.

The applications that succeed are the ones that answer the visual objection with drawings rather than with reassurance.

Use class and the open storage question

Open storage of caravans falls outside every class in the Use Classes Order, so it is sui generis. That has the same consequences as any sui generis use. The permission is drawn around the description you apply for, and moving into caravan sales, repairs, valeting or the storage of boats and trailers is a further change of use unless you ask for it now.

Describe the use accurately at the outset: "Change of use of agricultural land to open storage of touring caravans and motorhomes, with associated hardstanding, access and boundary treatment". A description that says only "storage use" invites a condition that fixes it narrowly anyway.

Two permitted development questions come up, and both usually fail. The 28-day temporary use right in Part 4 does not help, because use as a caravan site is excluded from it and because storage on this scale is rarely temporary in character. And agricultural permitted development under Part 6 covers development reasonably necessary for agriculture, which caravan storage is not.

Visual impact in open countryside

A field of caravans is visible. That is the objection, and it cannot be argued away, so the application has to show it has been minimised.

What works:

• Siting the storage area against existing buildings, woodland or a rising landform rather than in the middle of an open field.
• Keeping the area compact and regular rather than sprawling to the field boundaries.
• Using existing hedgerows as screening and reinforcing them with native species planting, with a stated establishment period.
• Limiting the height of what is stored, or zoning taller motorhomes to the least visible part of the site.
• Avoiding ridgelines and skylines in views from public rights of way.

Prepare a short landscape and visual appraisal with annotated photographs from the nearest public vantage points, taken in winter when hedges are bare. Summer photographs of a well-screened site are the oldest trick in the book and officers know it. Where the site is in or near a National Landscape or National Park, a fuller landscape and visual impact assessment following recognised methodology is proportionate.

Offer a condition requiring the storage area to be kept within a defined area shown on an approved plan. It is the single most reassuring thing you can put in front of a case officer worried about creep.

Surfacing, drainage and permeability

The surfacing choice does more work than applicants expect, because it drives both the visual reading of the site and the drainage position.

A full tarmac or concrete area reads as an industrial yard, generates surface water run-off that has to be managed, and is harder to reverse. A permeable solution, cellular confinement or a reinforced grass system on a granular bed, keeps the ground green between units, allows infiltration and is easier to argue as reversible.

Where surfacing is impermeable, or where the area is large, expect to provide a drainage scheme showing that run-off is no greater than the existing greenfield rate, with attenuation sized on the relevant rainfall event including a climate change allowance. Allowances are updated, so use the current published figures rather than an older set. Set the calculations out in the drainage strategy rather than leaving them in an engineer's email.

Two practical points. Caravans are stored on jockey wheels and corner steadies, which concentrate load, so a grass reinforcement system needs to be specified for the loading rather than chosen from a brochure. And a site with no foul drainage needs no foul provision at all, provided there is no office or welfare building, which is worth stating explicitly so the drainage consultee does not ask.

Access, manoeuvring and visibility

A car towing a caravan needs more space than a car, and highway officers assess the access on that basis.

Show visibility splays measured against recorded vehicle speeds on the lane rather than the posted speed limit. Show the swept path for the largest towing combination you expect, entering, turning and leaving in forward gear. Show where a vehicle waits while the gate is opened, off the carriageway. On a narrow lane, the question of passing places between the site and the nearest classified road will be raised.

Trip generation is low and seasonal. Movements concentrate on Friday and Saturday mornings at the start of the season, on Sunday evenings at the end of trips and around bank holidays, with almost nothing in midwinter. Set the pattern out honestly rather than describing the site as generating a handful of movements a day, because the peak is what the highway authority cares about.

Security lighting and fencing

Insurers want lighting and fencing. The countryside does not.

Design lighting to the minimum that achieves security: low mounting heights, full cut-off luminaires with no upward light, motion activation rather than dusk-to-dawn operation, and a curfew condition. A lighting assessment prepared against recognised obtrusive light guidance is proportionate where the site is in a dark rural area or near a hedgerow used by bats as a commuting route. Councils usually expect a suitably qualified author for that work.

Fencing is the same problem in a different form. Security fencing on a rural boundary reads badly, and the usual resolution is to set a mesh fence behind an existing or newly planted hedge so that the hedge does the visual work. Palisade fencing on an open field boundary is refused routinely.

CCTV columns need to be shown on the drawings. Applicants leave them off and then install them, which becomes an enforcement matter.

An illustrative example

A 0.6 hectare corner of an arable field, bounded on two sides by mature hedgerow and on a third by a farm building range, takes 60 touring caravans on a reinforced grass system laid on a granular sub-base. Access is via the existing farm entrance, widened with visibility splays taken from a speed survey, with a gravel waiting area inside the gate. Lighting is four 4 metre columns with full cut-off heads on motion sensors, curfewed at 2300. The hedgerow on the open side is reinforced with a double-staggered native hedge and five standard trees, and the storage area is defined on a plan for condition. This example is illustrative.

Seasonal use, turnover and biodiversity net gain

Storage sites empty in summer and fill in winter, which is the opposite of a touring site. Explain the pattern, because members sometimes assume caravans will be occupied.

Biodiversity net gain applies to development on agricultural land and the change from arable or improved grassland to hardstanding will register as habitat loss on the statutory metric. Whether the 10 per cent gain can be delivered on site depends on how much of the holding you are prepared to commit, and the biodiversity gain plan has to be approved by the local planning authority before development begins. The metric should be completed by a competent person under the Environment Act 2021 regime, and an AI-assisted draft is a starting point for that person rather than a substitute.

Run the metric early. A scheme that works on land take and highways can still fail on the gain arithmetic, and finding that out after submission wastes a determination period.

Conditions restricting occupation

The condition that always appears prohibits occupation of any caravan on the site. Expect wording that no caravan shall be occupied for residential or holiday purposes at any time, and that no caravan shall be connected to services.

Others to anticipate:

1. Storage limited to touring caravans, motorhomes and trailers, with numbers capped and the storage area defined on an approved plan.
2. No sales, servicing, repairs, valeting or dismantling on site.
3. Hours of access restricted, usually to daytime with a limited extension on changeover days.
4. Landscaping implemented in the first planting season and maintained, with replacement of failures for five years.
5. Lighting in accordance with an approved scheme, with a curfew.
6. Surfacing materials as approved, and no additional hardstanding without consent.

Build the case in a planning statement that takes each local plan criterion for countryside development in turn, and attaches the visual appraisal, drainage calculations, highway drawings and metric output as appendices. PlanScope drafts are AI-assisted and structured to UK planning policy, with missing site facts flagged rather than invented. Reports should be reviewed before submission. We do not guarantee planning approval.

This is general guidance, not legal advice. Check the position with your local planning authority and a qualified professional before relying on it. Enter your postcode on PlanScope to see which reports your site needs.