PlanScope Blog – Page 111
Practical guides to UK planning applications: which reports your council expects, permitted development, constraints, costs and how to prepare each document.
Articles – page 111
9446 articlesReading the module breakdown in a whole life carbon assessment
Upfront carbon, embodied carbon and whole life carbon are three different numbers. Knowing which modules each covers is how you read an assessment properly.
Corner windows on a rear extension
A corner opening takes out the element the structure wants most. The goal post frame, the glazing tolerance and the oblique overlooking objection all follow.
Reviewing somebody else's daylight report
An optimistic daylight report rarely contains a false number. It contains omitted windows, a convenient baseline and relief applied only where results fail.
Future Homes Standard: what it changes for a small scheme
The Future Homes Standard is a Building Regulations change, not a planning one. For a small scheme it lands on the heating system, the fabric and your dates.
Biomass and combustion plant emissions in an application
Planning assesses the effect of emissions on receptors; permitting regulates the plant. A boiler can need both, and the two processes do not align by themselves.
Tree officer site visits and what they inspect
The officer looks at the fence line first. Here is the full checklist, the consequences of an incursion, and the site record that protects you.
Walkthrough: a mixed use scheme above a railway line
Building over an operational railway puts the infrastructure owner at the centre of the programme. An illustrative walkthrough of how the sequence runs.
Fire statement triggers by height and storey count
A fire statement is a validation requirement for relevant buildings. The thresholds look simple; the measurement rules catch schemes out on sloping sites.
Answering an overlooking and privacy refusal reason
Loss of privacy refusals come in three forms. Each needs a different answer, and the drawing matters more than the argument.
Ownership certificates and notices under section 65
Section 65 requires you to certify who owned the application land 21 days before submission. Getting it wrong can unpick a permission years later.
The remediation strategy and verification plan explained
The remediation strategy sits between the phase 2 investigation and the verification report. Written without a verification plan, it is usually returned.
A glazed link between a house and an outbuilding
A glazed link makes a detached outbuilding part of the dwelling. That changes which permitted development class applies and how the use is assessed.
External wall construction as a planning matter
Planning judges appearance; Regulation 7 judges reaction to fire. On a relevant building the two have to be reconciled at application stage, not in technical design.
Rooflights and the daylight they actually deliver
A rooflight sees most of the sky dome, which is why loft conversions work. Here is how pitch, orientation and the conservation detail change what you get.
Discharging a renewable energy condition after completion
A renewable energy condition is discharged with commissioning evidence, not a promise. Here is what each wording needs and how to sequence it before occupation.
Choosing a representative background on an industrial estate
A five decibel shift in the adopted background moves a BS 4142 assessment from one impact band to the next. Here is how to choose and defend the figure.
The five year maintenance condition on new planting
Planting that dies within five years must be replaced in the next planting season. The obligation runs with the land and survives the sale of the house.
Rainfall data choices and the design storm profile
Summer or winter profile, FEH13 or an older model, and which grid reference. These inputs decide the attenuation volume and belong on the face of the calculation.
Alternating uses: one building, two timetabled uses
Sharing a building by timetable does not automatically create a second planning use. Here is where the line falls and what the application should say.
Walkthrough: an annexe that became a separate dwelling
An illustrative walkthrough of a garden annexe let to a tenant, the enforcement enquiry that followed, and the two routes back to a lawful position.
Five dwellings: where policy thresholds begin to bite
Five dwellings sits below major development but well above an infill plot. Here is which obligations attach at that scale and which do not.
Section 195 appeals on a refused certificate of lawfulness
An appeal against a refused lawful development certificate asks only whether the facts are proved on the balance of probabilities. Here is how to build that case.
The written agreement rule for conditions before works
A council must give notice and obtain written agreement before imposing a condition that bites before development begins. Silence for ten working days counts as agreement.
Trading rules and bespoke compensation in a BNG assessment
The biodiversity metric decides what you may use as replacement habitat, band by band. A scheme can show a unit surplus and still fail the trading rules.
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