PlanScope Blog – Page 38
Practical guides to UK planning applications: which reports your council expects, permitted development, constraints, costs and how to prepare each document.
Articles – page 38
9578 articlesPre-application charging: what a fee band includes
Pre-application advice is a discretionary service charged under section 93 of the Local Government Act 2003, and income cannot exceed the cost of providing it. Read the published schedule before you budget.
Party wall risk on a basement dig
A basement dig almost always triggers an adjacent excavation notice, and the party wall process runs alongside planning rather than inside it. Serve early and record the neighbour's house before you start.
Daylight to commercial and retail frontages
Shops are assumed to be artificially lit, so daylight loss to a frontage attracts little planning weight. Offices and workrooms are different, and rights of light run on a track of their own.
Flood resilience for a basement conversion
A basement bedroom is highly vulnerable development, which rules it out of Flood Zone 3a and puts it through the Exception Test in Zone 2. The engineering follows from that, starting with where the water comes from.
Agricultural units: what Part 6 means by a unit
Part 6 of the GPDO splits agricultural permitted development at five hectares, measured across the unit in occupation rather than the field you want to build on. Occupation, not ownership, decides it.
Vacant building credit against the ten unit threshold
The vacant building credit offsets affordable housing contributions by the floorspace of a vacant building. It does not shrink your unit count, and it will not rescue a building the council treats as abandoned.
Evidence standards for a certificate of existing lawful use
A section 191 certificate turns on evidence, not merits. The applicant carries the burden on the balance of probabilities, and precise unambiguous documents beat a thick bundle of vague ones.
Temporary stop notices and what they can require
A temporary stop notice bites immediately, cannot be appealed, and runs only for the period written on its face. Here is what one can and cannot prohibit, and what to do in the first two days.
Advertisement consent: deemed consent and express consent
Advertisement control is a separate consent system, and the council can consider only amenity and public safety. Stay inside the class limits and no application is needed.
Drafted reports and the public sector equality duty
No document an applicant submits discharges the public sector equality duty. Your job is to give the authority the facts it needs to do its own assessment.
Article 4 directions in conservation areas and their effect
A direction does not ban the work. It removes the automatic permission, so the council decides. Applications needed only because of a direction carry no fee.
Challenging a levy demand: reviews and appeals
The chargeable amount is fixed by the liability notice and the clock runs from its date. Starting work on site closes the appeal routes that matter most.
Lightwells, flooding and the drainage interaction
Cut a deep void into a garden that slopes towards the house and you have made a sump. The drainage design matters more than the glazing.
Daylight in classrooms and school extensions
A deep classroom with glazing on one wall gives the back row a fraction of the light and the front row the glare. Uniformity matters as much as quantity.
The second limb of the flood exception test
Applicants argue the sustainability limb and lose on the safety limb. The Environment Agency tests the second one number by number.
Part 3 Class G: creating a flat above a shop
Class G turns a shop into a mixed use with up to two flats above, without a prior approval application. The access door is usually the part that needs permission.
The 0.5 hectare trigger on an outline application
An outline application for housing with no number stated on a 0.6 hectare site is major by area. Writing up to nine dwellings in the description avoids it.
Stopping up a public right of way for a development
A public right of way can only be removed or moved by a statutory order, made by a different body on a different timetable from the planning permission.
Reports for a small-scale data centre
Two issues decide a small data centre application: plant noise against a low nighttime background, and whether the electrical connection actually exists.
Reading a drafted planning balance critically
Section 38(6) asks you to weigh, decide and say so. Drafts are good at retrieving policy and poor at attributing weight, which is exactly where to edit.
Section 278 agreements and how they differ from section 106
A section 106 obligation often requires you to enter a section 278 agreement, which is why the two get confused. Different counterparties, different money.
Building near a World Heritage Site buffer zone
A scheme outside the buffer zone can still harm outstanding universal value through a view. Read the statement of inscription before you read the constraint map.
Buildings over railways and tunnels: structural safeguarding
The council decides the application and the infrastructure owner sets the movement limits. A permission without an asset protection agreement is not buildable.
Average daylight factor against climate-based modelling
ADF gives one percentage per room under a uniform overcast sky. Climate-based modelling simulates every daylight hour of the year. Policy decides which you need.
Not sure which documents your council will ask for?
Enter your postcode and PlanScope recommends the right reports for your project, then drafts them in minutes.
Enter your postcode on PlanScope