PlanScope Blog – Page 110
Practical guides to UK planning applications: which reports your council expects, permitted development, constraints, costs and how to prepare each document.
Articles – page 110
9447 articlesDocuments for a floodlit sports court in a housing area
Two issues decide these applications: obtrusive light at the nearest windows and the sharp, repetitive noise of ball on racket. Everything else is secondary.
Per capita consumption in a water supply assessment
The headline figure in a water supply assessment is litres per person per day. Everything else in the document exists to show how the fittings schedule reaches it.
Head height and floor levels in a loft conversion
Measure from the top of the ceiling joist to the underside of the ridge before anything else. That one dimension decides whether the loft works at all.
Keeping a chimney stack in a loft conversion
Removing the breast and keeping the stack is the usual compromise. It needs structural support, party wall notices and a drawing that shows what stays.
Basement lightwells in a front garden
A lightwell in a front garden is the most publicly visible part of a basement. Most refusals turn on the railings, the boundary wall and the loss of planting.
Daylight evidence for a listed building conversion
Deep plan historic buildings rarely meet modern daylight targets through their existing openings. The answer is an evidenced trade-off, not a silent shortfall.
Overheating: Approved Document O against CIBSE TM59
Approved Document O and TM59 answer different questions with different criteria. A scheme can pass one and fail the other, and officers increasingly ask for both.
Walkthrough: shopfront and flats above a parade
Flats above a shop look like a simple conversion until you work out where the front door goes, how the bins get out and what the extraction fan does at 11pm.
Appeals where new policy is adopted after the decision
An inspector decides the appeal on the policy in force at the date of the decision, not the date of refusal. That single rule drives most of the tactics.
Agricultural holdings notices and who must receive one
An agricultural tenant gets a notice even though they are not an owner. Missing it can invalidate the application or, worse, the permission.
Documents for a residential building of 18 metres or more
At 18 metres or seven storeys a residential building becomes a relevant building for Planning Gateway One, and the Building Safety Regulator becomes a statutory consultee.
The benchmark land value section of a viability appraisal
Change the benchmark land value and you change the answer. It is the input that decides most viability arguments, and the one with the least agreed methodology.
Pitched or flat roof dormers on a rear slope
A flat roof dormer gives more usable floor area. A pitched dormer sits better on most roofs. Which matters more depends on the pitch of your roof and your council's design guide.
Party wall and underpinning alongside a basement plan
Planning permission for a basement tells you nothing about whether you may excavate next to your neighbour. That is a separate statutory process with its own notices and its own surveyors.
Amenity space standards and useable outdoor space
Most amenity space policies set an area. Whether the space works depends on its depth, its orientation and whether anyone can put a table on it.
SAP 10 carbon factors and the heat pump case
The revised electricity emission factor changed the arithmetic of every energy statement. A heating strategy that failed on carbon under the old figure can pass under the new one.
Lighting, bats and keeping a dark corridor
Bats avoid lit flight lines, so a scheme that lights a hedgerow has severed a commuting route whether or not anyone measured it. The design fixes are mostly geometric.
Woodland creation on a development site and its upkeep
New woodland is easy to draw and hard to keep alive. The planting design, the establishment regime and the legal mechanism all have to agree with each other.
Walkthrough: extending a touring caravan site
Planning permission and a site licence are two separate consents with two separate tests. An extension to a touring site needs both, and the order matters.
Site area measurement and why the red line matters
The red line is the most consequential drawing in the application pack. It sets the fee, the thresholds you cross and what the permission actually authorises.
Answering a parking shortfall refusal with survey data
A refusal on parking provision is rarely answered by arguing about the adopted standard. It is answered with kerbside data collected on the right nights.
Time limits for implementation and a material start
A permission that is not implemented in time lapses for good. Section 56 sets out what counts as beginning development, and the detail trips people up more often than the deadline does.
Documents for a scheme of exactly ten dwellings
Ten units is the line between minor and major development in England. The submission, the timetable and the obligations all change on the day you cross it.
Vertical sky component and sunlight hours explained
VSC, daylight distribution and APSH are three separate tests with three separate reference values. Officers and inspectors treat them differently, and the reasons are worth knowing.
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