Big Jimbo

Get that, however, i can fit both of the new houses inside the one extended house. 8mins walk to bus stop. 16mins walk to high st, and nearer to the village green, tennis club, football club, than most of the houses within the village boundary. Two houses at aprox 1500sq ft each have to be better than one large house.

Well done Russell. I think i could ProDave, but they did make a veiled comment about the designs, so it may be best to have a pro re-visit them. I don't think i made enough of the special circumstances, so again i think it would be worth having a pro look at the planning statement. So far i have done everything myself, so might be best to spend a few bob and get a pro application in, that would be strong enough to go to appeal if ness

Good morning. I'm Jim from Bovingdon, in Hertfordshire. My wife and i purchased a 1942 built bungalow on a half acre plot about 20 months ago. Although it is in the Green belt, i didn't really give it a great deal of thought. I did check that the was no artical 4. Once i started looking into it i realised that i might have a bit of an issue re Green belt. I spoke to the planning dept at Dacorum council and decided to adopt the following route. Rear 8 mt deep full width extension under the neighbourhood consultation scheme. No probs. Obtained an LDC for extensions to either side of the property , gable ends to the roof, and a dormer. Using this i then drew up the ugliest property i could sticking within what i could do re the above. I then drew up a modernish, flat roof, slate hung house that used the existing bungalow of about 650 sq ft, and extended it to about 2850 sq ft. I sent this in for permission, together with the ugly one, and waited to see how i got on. The delegated planning officer had to be just about the most uncommunicative, no personality, person i had ever spoken to. I think i got 4 supports, and one objection from the nearest neighbour. The planning officer never contacted me once, so after about Six weeks i started trying to ring him. I must have left him atleast 20 telephone messages, but he never returned any of them. Once the 8 weeks had passed i wrote to the head of planning, and said i thought that the service, for which i was paying was a joke. Finally, my delegated officer contacted me. He said he could'nt pass my modern design, "No way" and so i asked him what might get passed. He would'nt really commit to anything, so i did about 5 different designs and emailed them to him. I rang him a week later and said i needed him to look at them, and give me some feedback. I basically got, Number 1, No, 2No 3No 4no 5Looks okish. I seized on that and said to him. Right my current proposal is now about 3 weeks overdue, If i withdraw it, and re-apply with design 5, will you look after that application for me, and get it sorted. Basically, this, after a couple of extensions of time, and some gentle nudging from me got passed. So i now have Planning to extend a 650ish sq ft bungalow in the Greenbelt into about 3000sq ft. Although no the best design in the world. However as far as i'm concerned RESULT. This got me thinking, so i got my pencil out again. I then designed 2 four bedroom detached houses side by side, but made sure that i kept them within the footprint of the large extended house, and that the front view of the Two houses (bulk) fitted inside the front view of the front view of the extended house for which i obtained permission. I emailed this off to the planning officer, and asked what he thought. "Would it not be better for me to provide Two houses for future generations, than One large house. " No response was all i got from him. Anyway, I thought about it for a while, and to be honest. I don't need a 3000sq ft house, and i do fundamentally believe that it would be much better to provide Two houses for Two family's. So i sent in my application for Two houses. ...... Refused, however they took no account of what they had already given planning permission for, and compared the new Two houses to the existing Bungalow, saying that they didn't consider that the planning permission that was obtained, would be implemented. So as of now, i'm looking for an architect, and a professional planning statement writer. I will have the architect re-visit, and re-fine my designs. Have a professional planning statement written, and re-submit using my free go, making it clear that i will go straight to appeal after 8 weeks. Sorry to ramble, but so much to tell, and what a great site this is.