PlanScope Blog – Page 33
Practical guides to UK planning applications: which reports your council expects, permitted development, constraints, costs and how to prepare each document.
Articles – page 33
9588 articlesParking surveys, school holidays and the survey calendar
The overnight parking methodology works because it counts cars when people are at home. School holidays, vacations and August break that assumption and cost a repeat survey.
Flagged gaps in a draft and how to close them properly
An AI draft that stops and flags a missing site fact is safer than one that estimates it. How to close each kind of flag from the source a council would check.
Dry riser inlets and where they land on an elevation
Fire main inlets are a building regulations requirement that lands on a planning elevation. Where BS 9990 allows the box to go, and how to draw it before permission rather than after.
Fabric energy efficiency and condition wording that works
A condition listing U-values breaks the moment an insulation product changes. One naming a fabric performance figure and its methodology survives the build and is easier to discharge.
Lighting assessments for floodlit outdoor sport
Floodlighting refusals turn on spill, glare and curfews rather than on pitch illuminance. The outputs a council expects, and the modelling assumptions that get challenged.
Kerbside management for a town centre scheme
A planning permission cannot deliver a kerbside change. The order is a separate statutory process with its own timetable and its own ways of failing, and the risk needs pricing early.
War memorials: repair, relocation and consent
Repair and added names are routinely consented. Relocation is treated as harm to a deliberately chosen setting. How the consent routes differ, including the faculty system in churchyards.
Developer return assumptions by tenure in an appraisal
National guidance works from 15 to 20 per cent of gross development value and accepts a lower return on affordable housing. How to split, evidence and sensitivity test the figure.
Merging two shop units into one and the frontage test
Combining two retail units rarely needs permission for the works. The test that matters is the adopted plan's policy on losing units and on maximum shopfront width.
Development classification in Northern Ireland explained
Northern Ireland sorts applications into three statutory classes, and the class decides the decision maker, the pre-application duties and the appeal route. How to establish yours before you submit.
Counting units where the scheme is an HMO or cluster flats
Bedspaces, planning units and dwelling equivalents are three different numbers, and the one you put on the form decides which thresholds bite. How to work out the count and defend it.
Replacing a boundary wall in a conservation area
Demolition and replacement of a boundary wall in a conservation area are two separate consents with two different height tests. Here is how the thresholds work and what to record before the wall comes down.
Motorcycle and powered two-wheeler parking requirements
Powered two-wheeler provision comes from the authority's own parking standards rather than national policy, which is why it is so often missed until the highway consultation.
Residential sprinklers to BS 9251 and the planning angle
Sprinklers are a Building Regulations requirement with a planning consequence: a stored supply needs a tank and pump room, and that room has to be on the submitted drawings.
Connecting to a district heat network: the requirement
Heat network requirements come from local plan policy rather than national rules. Distance to the nearest network, and its programme, decide most of these cases.
Odour and separation distances from agricultural buildings
Distances quoted in objections range from 100 to 400 metres and none of them is statutory. The source, the receptor, the wind and the management regime decide the case.
Ice houses, dovecotes and small ancillary structures
Clearing ivy off a dovecote can need listed building consent and a bat licence. Establish the designation, record before touching anything, and stabilise rather than restore.
Employment and skills plans secured by planning obligation
An employment and skills plan is a delivery contract, not a statement of intent. The definitions of construction value and local area decide whether the targets are achievable.
Subdividing one retail unit into two: what needs permission
Internal works that do not affect external appearance are not development, and movement within a use class is not a material change of use. The application usually comes from the shopfront or a condition.
Which policy applies in Northern Ireland before an LDP
Northern Ireland policy is district-specific and changes on a date. Retained planning policy statements cease to apply in a council area once its Plan Strategy is adopted.
Water and sewerage capacity as the unit count rises
The point at which a connection becomes a reinforcement programme varies by catchment, not by policy. Submit the pre-development enquiry before the layout is drawn.
Extending a flat at ground floor into a garden
A ground floor flat extension needs a full planning application rather than a householder one, and the amenity of the flats above matters as much as the neighbours'.
Housing mix policies and dwelling size requirements
Mix and space standards come from the local plan, not from national rules, and the nationally described space standard only applies where an authority has adopted it with evidence.
Botanical condition surveys and the growing season
Habitat condition scoring needs plants in growth, so the April to September window sets the submission date rather than the other way round. Work the programme backwards from it.
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