PlanScope Blog – Page 31
Practical guides to UK planning applications: which reports your council expects, permitted development, constraints, costs and how to prepare each document.
Articles – page 31
9590 articlesTrade waste storage and bin stores for a commercial unit
You can argue about use class. You cannot argue a 1,100 litre bin into a 900 millimetre passage. How to size, site and evidence a trade waste store that gets through validation.
Taking apart a reason for refusal
A refusal notice is a set of separate claims, not a verdict. Split each reason into facts, judgement, policy and evidence gaps, and the route between appeal and resubmission chooses itself.
Call-in by the Secretary of State under section 77
Call-in moves the decision to the Secretary of State and almost always means an inquiry. What the published policy covers, how holding directions work, and what to tell a client.
Benchmark land value and the existing use value approach
The benchmark is the comparator that decides whether a scheme can carry policy obligations. Existing use value plus a premium, the evidence it needs, and the errors that lose the argument.
Basement light wells, guarding and usable amenity
A light well that satisfies falls protection can starve the room of daylight, and a sump is a single point of failure. How to resolve the four requirements as one design.
Structuring an energy statement to the Be Seen stage
Be seen requires reported performance data for at least five years of operation. The metering strategy, the three reporting stages and how to secure a commitment that outlives the applicant.
Historic graveyard walls, monuments and access works
A churchyard can hold listed monuments, curtilage-listed walls, a scheduled feature and conservation area controls at once, with faculty jurisdiction over most of it. How to sequence the permissions.
Occupying a unit with no established lawful use
Whether your intended trade needs permission depends entirely on the unit's existing lawful use. Where there is no planning history, the evidence has to be built before you sign.
What a planning inquiry actually costs to run
Sitting days drive every other line in an inquiry budget. How advocacy, witnesses, case management and event costs behave, and the issues to close before committing.
Publicising an environmental statement and its response period
An environmental statement triggers its own publicity regime under the EIA Regulations 2017, with a 30 day minimum for representations and a second round if further information is required.
Air quality monitoring periods and the data a council expects
Air quality objectives are annual means, so a short monitoring run has to be annualised before it means anything. The periods, the adjustments and the scoping letter that prevents a resubmission.
Clawback and overage clauses in affordable housing deals
A reduced affordable housing offer usually comes with a review mechanism in the section 106 agreement. Developer exposure turns on the trigger definitions, the surplus formula and whether the clause is capped.
Structural movement in a listed building and the repair schedule
A crack that stopped moving in 1890 needs recording, not underpinning. How to diagnose movement in a listed building, monitor it properly, and write a repair schedule a conservation officer will consent.
Part L 2021 fuel factors and the energy statement baseline
The Part L baseline is the notional dwelling, not a percentage. Current SAP factors favour electric heating on carbon and penalise it on primary energy, which changes what an energy statement has to prove.
Milestones, pumps and street furniture as heritage assets
A milestone or a village pump can be a listed building in law, and most damage to them happens during routine highway work rather than development. What the law protects and how to report harm.
Using Part 4 temporary rights for a pop-up in a vacant unit
Part 4 of Schedule 2 to the GPDO 2015 can let a short occupation of a vacant unit run without an application. The limits sit in the day counting and the excluded uses.
Arguing the presumption in favour of sustainable development
The tilted balance only helps if you prove the trigger and then show the harm does not clear the raised threshold. A practitioner's sequence for building that case on evidence.
Completing a section 106 agreement before the decision
Councils cannot issue a permission until the planning obligation is completed as a deed. Here is what sits on the critical path, from title problems to trigger drafting, and where a condition does the job instead.
Three year permissions and lawful commencement before winter
A lawful start means a material operation after every pre-start condition is discharged. Winter adds survey seasons, wet ground and frost to the programme.
Retaining walls on a site boundary and who approves them
A boundary retaining wall often needs planning permission, highway authority consent and a party wall notice, and nobody checks the structure unless you ask.
Phasing energy and carbon obligations on a large site
Fix infrastructure and methodology at outline, then tie each phase to the standard in force when it is designed. Offset payments belong phase by phase.
Sample panel conditions and how to clear them
A materials panel is judged against the existing wall in daylight. Mortar sand and joint finish decide most outcomes, and sourcing time decides the programme.
Existing use value of a tenanted building in an appraisal
Existing use value for a tenanted building is an investment valuation, not a vacant possession figure. Passing rent, the 1954 Act and section 18(1) all bite.
Inserting a mezzanine floor in a commercial unit
Internal works are not development, except for retail mezzanines above 200 square metres. Parking standards, levy liability and escape design apply either way.
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