PlanScope Blog – Page 302
Practical guides to UK planning applications: which reports your council expects, permitted development, constraints, costs and how to prepare each document.
Articles – page 302
8964 articlesThe three derogation tests for a protected species licence
The three tests in regulation 55 are cumulative, and the alternatives test is the one most often under-evidenced. What each requires, and how the planning decision and the licence fit together.
Tidal flood risk, breach modelling and coastal change
A site behind a good sea wall still sits in Flood Zone 3, because the mapping is undefended. The safety case is made by breach modelling, hazard rating and the defence's residual life.
High hedges complaints under the 2003 Act
Part 8 of the Anti-social Behaviour Act 2003 covers lines of evergreens over two metres, and nothing else. What the definition excludes, and what a remedial notice can and cannot require.
Operational waste strategy for a restaurant or takeaway
Most operational waste strategies fail because the store was drawn before the volume was calculated. The streams, the arithmetic, the store details and the collection route, in submission order.
Commuted sums for off-site affordable housing
National policy treats off-site payments as the exception, so the case has two halves: why not on site, and why this figure. Both need evidence before the section 106 is drafted.
Treasure finds on a development site: what happens next
Treasure reporting is a statutory duty with a criminal offence attached, and it falls on the finder. What the definition covers, who to ring, and how to settle reward shares before work starts.
Bat emergence and re-entry surveys: visits, timing, weather
Low roost potential means one visit, moderate two, high three. The season, the times relative to sunset and sunrise, and the weather conditions all decide whether a visit counts.
Groundwater flooding where there is no published map
The Flood Map for Planning covers rivers and the sea, not the water table. Where groundwater is the risk, the evidence has to be assembled plot by plot, and winter monitoring takes a season.
Tree protection fencing and the construction exclusion zone
Tree protection fails on site, not on the drawing. What the exclusion zone covers, what the default barrier actually is, and how to vary it without breaching the condition.
Flood risk assessment structure for a home in Flood Zone 2
A single dwelling in Flood Zone 2 needs the same section order as a major scheme at a fraction of the length. The document turns on the modelled level, the climate change uplift and the floor level.
Marketing evidence for a change of use: what councils accept
Councils reject marketing evidence when premises were offered at alternative-use value or on terms no operator would take. What to price at, how long to run it and what the enquiry log must show.
Human remains on a development site: the licence
Removing buried human remains needs a separate licence from the Ministry of Justice, or a faculty on consecrated ground. Former burial grounds carry a further statutory notice period before building.
Conservation covenants and responsible bodies in practice
Created by the Environment Act 2021, a conservation covenant binds whoever owns the land next and lasts indefinitely over freehold unless the deed says otherwise. What landowners should check first.
Permeable paving on clay soils: when it still works
A poor percolation test rules out full infiltration, not permeable paving. On clay the pavement becomes a shallow tanked attenuation structure with a controlled outlet, and it is sized on void ratio.
Ash dieback and the duty on landowners
Infected ash fails brittly and often without warning. What a proportionate inspection regime looks like, when felling is exempt from licence, and what a tree preservation order still requires.
Travel plans: targets, monitoring and the coordinator role
A travel plan outlives the planning decision by five years. The baseline, the target wording, the coordinator funding and the remedial measures bond decide whether it works or just sits in the obligation.
Opening a padel or indoor racket venue
Indoor sport sits in Class E(d), so a gym unit converts freely. A warehouse or an open site does not. The decisive evidence is impulsive ball strike noise, not floor area.
Written representations appeal: documents and deadlines
The appeal pack is a fixed list and the deadlines are absolute. What to lodge with the form, what the council supplies, and how the written representations timetable runs from the start date letter.
Reports needed for a floodlit sports pitch
A full-size floodlit pitch is usually a major application. The evidence that decides it is the lighting assessment, the noise case at absolute levels, the drainage strategy and the Sport England response.
Heritage Statement structure for a non-designated asset
For a locally listed house, the statement that works runs to about six pages and spends most of them on evidence. Here is the structure, section by section.
Finding and reading a CIL charging schedule
The published rate is never the rate you pay. Indexation, deductions for existing floorspace and the forms you file before starting all change the final demand.
Justifying the loss of a designated employment site
Marketing evidence is the price of entry, and most of it fails on price rather than duration. The stronger case usually comes from obsolescence and from the council's own supply figures.
Scheduled monument consent: applying under the 1979 Act
A scheduled monument on your land brings a consent regime that runs entirely outside the planning system, with strict liability offences and no application fee.
Securing the 30 year management and monitoring obligation
Delivering the units is the easy part. Holding the habitat in the right condition for three decades, through two changes of ownership, is what the legal mechanism has to survive.
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