PlanScope Blog – Page 200
Practical guides to UK planning applications: which reports your council expects, permitted development, constraints, costs and how to prepare each document.
Articles – page 200
9250 articlesCorrecting an error in a planning decision notice
A council cannot simply withdraw a decision notice it has issued. Section 96A, section 73, the statutory correction power for inspectors' decisions and a fresh application each cover different errors.
Round table sessions at a planning inquiry
At a round table the inspector asks the questions and advocates step back. It is less adversarial, not less consequential, and it rewards a table of positions rather than a proof to be defended.
Requesting information from a planning file
Most of a planning file is already public and the part you want usually is not. Which regime to use, what councils withhold, and how to frame a request that gets answered.
The two tier planning system in Northern Ireland
Eleven councils determine most applications and the Department for Infrastructure takes the regionally significant ones. The category decides the consultation, the decision-maker and the appeal route.
What drives the price of a flood risk assessment
The same plot can need a two-page screening statement or a modelled assessment with breach analysis. The cost is set by the data available, not by the size of the scheme.
Nullity and invalidity of an enforcement notice
A nullity has no legal effect at all. An invalid notice takes effect unless appealed and its errors may be corrected. Knowing which you have decides how the appeal is run.
Unilateral undertakings against bilateral agreements
Both instruments are made under section 106 and both bind successors. The choice turns on whether the council needs to promise anything in return, and on how fast you need the deed completed.
Editing a drafted heritage statement to match the asset
A drafted heritage statement describes a type of building well and yours poorly. The edit that matters replaces generic description with what is actually there and assesses effect element by element.
High hedges, trees and light to a neighbouring house
Loss of light to a hedge is a complaint to the council under the Anti-social Behaviour Act 2003. Loss of light to a tree has almost no remedy. Knowing which applies saves a fee and six months.
Peak electrical demand and all-electric heating
All-electric heating replaces a gas connection with a much larger electrical one, and reinforcement sits outside the developer's control. What the application has to show about demand, capacity and phasing.
Sports pitch floodlighting and curfew conditions
Floodlighting applications turn on spill and hours. The documents that settle them are an iso-illuminance plot, an aiming schedule and a condition that controls lighting hours, use hours and the timer.
Notification of planning applications to Scottish Ministers
Notification bites after a Scottish authority has decided to approve, not before. The categories that trigger it, what happens during the pause, and why withdrawing a statutory objection is the whole game.
Enforcement appeal grounds (f) and (g) in practice
Grounds (f) and (g) accept the breach and attack what the council demands. They can turn demolition into modification and two months into a year, and section 173(11) may leave you with a permission.
How long a decision notice takes after a committee vote
Planning permission exists only when the decision notice is issued. On a small site with a section 106 agreement that is commonly six to twelve weeks after the vote. Here is what is happening and what you can influence.
Why drafts over-cite national policy and miss the local plan
The development plan decides the application and the Framework is a material consideration. Why automated drafting inverts that, and the ten-minute correction that puts local policy back at the front.
Privacy and overlooking distances between dwellings
England has no national separation distance. The 21 metre figure comes from local design guidance, and knowing that tells you when it can be argued with and what evidence a departure needs.
Roof space competition: plant, solar panels and green roof
Policy asks a flat roof to carry plant, panels, greening and attenuation as though the others were not there. How to allocate the area, what biosolar needs, and how to condition it without freezing the plant.
EV charging as air quality mitigation in planning
Most charge points offered as air quality mitigation are already required by Part S. What the baseline is, how to specify passive provision that works, and where charging sits in the mitigation hierarchy.
The hierarchy of developments in Scotland explained
In Scotland the development category decides whether you must consult the community twelve weeks before applying, how long determination takes and where an appeal goes. Here is how to work out which category applies.
Enforcement appeal ground (d) and immunity periods
Ground (d) says the breach was already immune when the notice was issued. The time limits have changed, the transitional line depends on when the breach arose, and the burden of proving continuity is yours.
Conditions added at committee and how they get drafted
A condition proposed from the floor carries the same force as one drafted in the officer report, with none of the scrutiny. What officers may change under delegation, and the four routes to fixing a bad condition.
When must a council tell you about a neighbour's plans
For a householder application the council can choose a site notice instead of writing to you, and that is lawful. Here is what article 15 requires, who counts as adjoining, and how to act if the publicity failed.
The public datasets behind automatic constraint checks
Automated constraint screening is only as good as the datasets behind it. What each national layer records, the gaps that matter on a real site, and the checks that close them.
Data centre heat recovery into a district heat network
Heat offtake is the benefit most likely to win support for a data centre, and the one most often asserted without evidence. What the application has to show about temperature, route, plant and the offtake agreement.
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