PlanScope Blog – Page 124
Practical guides to UK planning applications: which reports your council expects, permitted development, constraints, costs and how to prepare each document.
Articles – page 124
9421 articlesSubdividing one house into two separate dwellings
Each resulting unit is assessed as a new home, so the space standard and the 2.3m ceiling height decide most subdivisions. The drawings, parking evidence and policy tests.
Dispersion model input appendices and what to check
A dispersion model is deterministic, so the only questions worth asking are about the inputs. The parameters to check, the red flags, and the seven sensitivity runs to request.
Which reports a site crossing half a hectare with six units needs
Naming six units keeps a 0.6 hectare site out of the major category, but the area still drives the ecology, net gain and drainage work. The real triggers and the right sequence.
A cattery: licensing, odour and neighbour amenity
Catteries are an easier amenity case than kennels, and the application should say why. Use class, licensing, wash-down drainage and the conditions that define the use.
Budgeting discharge of conditions across a build programme
Grouping conditions into three submissions instead of ten saves both the fees and about four months. The evidence each condition type needs, and where deemed discharge actually applies.
Checklist: what a highway authority wants with a new access
Most highway objections come from a splay drawn by eye and no speed survey. The drawings, dimensions and ownership evidence that get a new access approved first time.
Converting a closed public house into a dwelling
A closed pub is still a pub in planning terms. What marketing and viability evidence councils require, what an asset of community value listing changes, and why hybrid schemes succeed.
Odour exposure criteria and benchmark selection
The offensiveness category sets the benchmark before any modelling starts, and getting it wrong invalidates the conclusion. How criteria are chosen and what evidence supports them.
Which reports a scheme needing both flood tests needs
Where flood zone and vulnerability combine, three documents have to work together for three different readers. What the sequential test, exception test and FRA each have to prove.
Class B roof extensions and the highway-facing roof slope
Two conditions have to be met together before Class B bars a front dormer: the slope must form the principal elevation and it must front a highway. The limits, conditions and exceptions.
Supervision chains: graduate work signed by a chartered author
A signature says the signatory can defend the method under cross-examination. How to evidence real supervision, what to record about fieldwork, and where competence cannot be delegated.
Small scale food manufacturing in a light industrial unit
Whether food production is light industrial or general industrial depends on the process, the plant, the servicing and the hours. What councils assess and the conditions you will live with.
The cost of a non-material amendment under section 96A
The statutory fee is the cheapest part of a non-material amendment. What drives the real cost, why officers decline the route, and how 96A compares with section 73.
Worked example: sun on ground assessment on 21 March
A garden can meet the 50 per cent sunlight test and still fail the 0.8 proportional loss limb. An illustrative worked overlay from 9am to 3pm, with the arithmetic and the assumptions set out.
Planning permission for a dormer loft conversion in Article 4 area
Where an Article 4 direction removes Class B, a rear dormer needs a free planning application judged on design. The set-backs, window proportions and evidence that get one approved.
Sky glow and upward light calculations
A flat-glass floodlight with no upward output on the datasheet emits light to the sky as soon as it is tilted. How the upward light ratio is calculated, and the evidence dark area councils want.
Which reports a children's play barn in a rural building needs
Car park noise and a Saturday morning parking peak decide a rural play barn application, not the noise inside the building. The document list and the access evidence that carries it.
The 50 per cent curtilage test in Class A explained
Both sides of the 50 per cent calculation exclude the original house footprint, and the curtilage you measure is the historic one. How the test works and what to do if you have already exceeded it.
Changing consultant mid-application without losing evidence
Swapping planning consultant mid-application turns on copyright, reliance letters and who holds the survey files. The handover list, the notification to the case officer and the clauses that prevent it.
A skip hire or waste transfer yard: permit and permission
A skip yard needs two consents that control different things. Where planning stops and the environmental permit starts, and the conditions that get deleted on appeal.
What the planning application fee buys and what it does not
Planning fees are set nationally and indexed each April. What the fee actually covers, which categories are free, when a second fee is payable and what happens if an application is invalid.
Worked example: air quality damage cost calculation
The damage cost approach turns a scheme's extra emissions into a pound figure a council can ask for. An illustrative worked example, the inputs it needs, and where dispersion modelling takes over.
Lux contour plots and what they should show
A lux contour plot has to prove two things at once: that the lit area works, and that light is not escaping to a neighbour's window. Here is what the plot, the grid and the luminaire schedule need to show.
Planning permission for gates and a boundary wall by a road
The 1m limit next to a highway catches more front gardens than people expect, because a highway includes the footway and the verge. Height rules, listed curtilage, Article 4 and retaining walls explained.
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