PlanScope Blog – Page 169
Practical guides to UK planning applications: which reports your council expects, permitted development, constraints, costs and how to prepare each document.
Articles – page 169
9339 articlesReports for a large HMO of seven or more people
Above six occupants an HMO leaves Class C4 and becomes sui generis, with no permitted development route. Here is the evidence pack a council expects for a large HMO, and the conditions that follow permission.
Credit strategy in a BREEAM pre-assessment
A BREEAM pre-assessment credit strategy decides what the planning condition will hold you to. Here is how to set the target rating, handle minimum standards and protect the credits the consented design controls.
The golden thread of building information
The golden thread is a live information duty for higher-risk residential buildings, not a handover document. Here is what it must contain, who holds it at each stage, and why it begins with the Gateway One fire statement.
The evidence base for a nine dwelling greenfield scheme
Nine dwellings is the most efficient scale in the English planning system, sitting under several thresholds at once. The surveys are still seasonal, and that is what governs the programme.
The water calculator in a sustainability statement
The 110 litre standard comes from an optional requirement in Part G, applied through a planning condition. The calculation is fittings-based, and the shower is usually what decides it.
Embodied carbon modules A1 to A5, explained
A1 to A3 is the product stage, A4 is getting it to site and A5 is building with it. Added together they are upfront carbon, and on most schemes they dominate the whole life figure.
Barn owls in farm buildings: mitigation that works
There is no development licence for disturbing a nesting barn owl, so avoidance and timing carry the whole burden. That changes how a barn conversion is programmed and what the method statement has to say.
Institute of Acoustics grades and what they mean
Post-nominals tell you something about an acoustician, but not enough on their own. Here is what each grade signifies, what councils ask for, and the five questions to put to a consultant before appointing.
The eaves height rule within two metres of a boundary
Three metres of eaves height is tight once you allow for a floor build-up and a pitched roof. Here is where the two metres is measured from, how sloping ground is treated, and how to design with a margin.
Closing the gap between designed and as-built performance
The approved energy strategy and the finished building diverge for reasons that are mostly documented somewhere. Verification conditions work when they name the evidence, the parameter and the person producing it.
Overland flow arriving from neighbouring land
Water from the field above is your flood risk, not the neighbour's problem. Blocking it shifts the risk and creates liability, so the design has to carry it through the site.
Strategic gaps and green wedges as local designations
There is no national policy for a strategic gap, so the policy wording is the whole test. That makes the coalescence argument a landscape and perception question rather than a legal one.
Farm pond and reservoir creation: planning and waste rules
Digging is an engineering operation, and where the arisings end up can turn a simple pond into a waste operation. Here is how the planning, waste and watercourse consents fit together.
Attenuation tank or attenuation basin: which to use
Both hold the same volume of water. They differ on treatment value, land take, whole life cost and who will adopt them, and the choice is easiest to make before the layout is fixed.
Documents needed for a Class MA office to flats conversion
Class MA prior approval turns on a short list of prescribed matters, and natural light to habitable rooms is the one that sinks deep office floorplates. Here is the evidence pack that answers each of them.
Cumulative effects in an environmental statement
The regulations ask for effects in combination with other existing and approved projects. The hard part is deciding which projects count, over what area, and what to do when nobody will give you their data.
Target emission rate under Part L, explained
A target emission rate is not a fixed number. It is calculated from a notional version of your own building, which is why two schemes of the same size can face different targets.
Bat survey effort by roost suitability category
The number of bat survey visits your building needs is set by the roost suitability category from the initial assessment. One, two or three visits, in a season that closes in September.
What a Natural England mitigation licence lets an ecologist do
A mitigation licence is not permission to ignore bats. It authorises specific acts, by named people, in a stated way, after planning permission is granted and the three derogation tests are met.
What original dwellinghouse means for permitted development
Permitted development limits are measured from the house as it was on 1 July 1948, or as built if later. Work done by owners before you bought still uses up the allowance, and nothing resets it short of rebuilding.
Energy statements for refrigerated warehousing
Refrigeration is process energy, so it sits outside Part L and outside the percentage a carbon policy asks for. A cold store energy statement that ignores that is answering the wrong question.
Choosing a flow control for a very low discharge rate
Below about five litres per second the physics stops cooperating: the aperture needed is smaller than anything you would willingly put in a drain. Here is how to choose a device and what the strategy has to say about it.
Airport public safety zones and new dwellings
A public safety zone is drawn from an individual risk contour, not a noise line. Inside one, the policy objective is no increase in the number of people living, working or congregating, which rules out new dwellings.
The mitigation hierarchy in an ecological appraisal
Reviewers reject mitigation sections for asserting avoidance rather than evidencing it. Here is what each step of the hierarchy has to show, and how to word measures so a case officer can condition them.
Not sure which documents your council will ask for?
Enter your postcode and PlanScope recommends the right reports for your project, then drafts them in minutes.
Enter your postcode on PlanScope