PlanScope Blog – Page 357
Practical guides to UK planning applications: which reports your council expects, permitted development, constraints, costs and how to prepare each document.
Articles – page 357
8700 articlesHMO licensing and planning permission: two separate consents
A licence from the housing team says nothing about planning. Landlords who hold one and not the other are exposed on whichever side they have missed.
Foul Sewage Assessment: capacity evidence and the sections
Councils validate on the foul drainage answer more often than developers expect. The assessment has to follow the hierarchy and evidence each step it rejects.
Extending an Article 4 direction house: rights you lost
An Article 4 direction does not stop you extending. It turns work that needed no application into one that does, usually with no fee and a design case attached.
Nutrient neutrality: what it stops and where
Nutrient neutrality is a habitats law problem, not a planning policy choice. It stops new overnight accommodation in affected catchments until mitigation is secured.
Prior approval refusals under Class MA: how councils reason
Councils can only refuse a Class MA prior approval on a short list of grounds. Natural light accounts for more refusals than the rest of the list put together.
Greenfield run-off rate section of a Drainage Strategy
The greenfield run-off rate sets the discharge you are allowed and therefore the attenuation volume you have to find. Everything else in the strategy follows from it.
Extending a house in the Green Belt: the disproportionate test
Green Belt policy allows extensions that are not disproportionate additions over and above the original building. Everything turns on what the original building was.
Screening opinion: the first step in EIA
A screening opinion settles whether a scheme needs an environmental statement. Getting it early costs three weeks and can save a year of assessment work.
Article 4 directions on shopfronts and commercial frontages
An Article 4 direction turns work you could have done freely into a planning application. On commercial frontages it usually catches painting, signage and conversion.
Flood warning and evacuation plan section of an FRA
Emergency planners reject evacuation plans that name no one and trigger on nothing. Here is what the section has to contain to survive consultation.
Annexe for a relative: planning conditions and council tax
An annexe stands or falls on whether it stays ancillary to the main house. The planning condition, the layout and the council tax band all turn on the same question.
Statutory consultee: who the council must ask
A statutory consultee is a body the council is required by law to ask. Knowing which ones your site triggers tells you what evidence to submit on day one.
Section 106 or CIL: which applies to your scheme
The levy is a fixed charge on floorspace. A section 106 agreement is negotiated site-specific mitigation. Most schemes of any size end up doing both.
Climate change allowances section of an FRA
The climate change section is where a flood risk assessment sets the finished floor level. Choose the wrong allowance and the whole design case has to be redone.
Bats in your loft: what a conversion legally requires
Bat roosts are protected whether or not bats are present, and permitted development rights change nothing. Here is the sequence a loft conversion has to follow.
Neighbourhood plan: how much weight it carries
A made neighbourhood plan is part of the development plan, with the same statutory starting point as the local plan. Before it is made, its weight depends on the stage it has reached.
Council CIL charging schedules: reading zones and indexation
The rate printed in a charging schedule is almost never the rate you pay. Indexation, zone boundaries and floorspace deductions all sit between the two.
Writing the TPO consent statement for pruning works
Tree officers refuse vague applications, not pruning. A short statement that specifies the works properly and gives an arboricultural reason usually gets consent.
Extending near a protected tree without losing consent
A protected tree does not stop an extension, but it does decide where the walls go. Here is the order to work through before the drawings are finished.
Housing Delivery Test: what a failure triggers
The Housing Delivery Test compares homes delivered against homes required over three years. Falling below the thresholds changes how a council has to decide applications.
CIL Form 1 to Form 6: which notice to send and when
Most levy disputes start with a missed form rather than a disputed rate. Here is the running order from the application to the day before you start on site.
Root protection area calculations in an AIA
The root protection area is the number every tree officer checks first. Here is how BS 5837:2012 asks you to calculate it, reshape it and defend an encroachment.
Extending a house in Flood Zone 3: what to submit
An extension in Flood Zone 3 needs a flood risk assessment even when the works are modest. Here is what the council and the Environment Agency actually look for.
Development plan: what documents make it up
Councils decide applications in accordance with the development plan unless material considerations indicate otherwise. Knowing which documents are actually in it is the first move in any planning argument.
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