Planning permission - what are my chances?

[Karl]

I currently live in a small, locally listed church, which my wife and I converted 5 years ago.

It is on a plot approx 25 by 50 meters (over to one side).

 

i wish to cut off the bottom of the garden (15 by 25 meters), and build 2 semi detached houses approx 110 sq meters.

That would leave room for very small gardens (60 Sqm) and 2 parking spaces each.

 

When I (informally) approached the planning office, this was their response:

 

... However I have checked the location of the site and it falls within the 400m exclusion zone of the SPA therefore it is highly unlikely that any new residential dwelling would acceptable. Further to this the site also falls within a conservation area, curtilage of a listed building and sits outside the settlement boundary. Although these issues are not as insurmountable as the SPA exclusion zone it would need to be heavily justified as to why it is acceptable to build a new dwelling(s) in this location.

 

The above is a similar response to what you would receive if you submitted a formal pre-application advice request however if you would still like to continue you are welcome to do so.

 

The first part, regarding the exclusion zone is a mistake, I know categorically that the garden falls outside of the zone.  The rest I am not sure of.  Because the church does not sit centrally on the plot, losing the end of the garden will actually make the church look better (with a bit of careful landscaping!).  There is a large building (stable converted to offices) about 5 meters from the church on the other side.  The new houses will be approx 15 meters away).  

 

The main reason for building the properties is for my elderly mother to live close to us.  The second house will be sold to fund the build.  (In my favour, a similar build on a similarly small plot has happened a few hundred yards away.

 

Has anyone got any views on my realistic chances of getting permission?  If it helps, it is Hart District Council.  Any advice on how to approach things would be appreciated.  I have almost zero money, and obviously want to spend as little as possible, before I get a realistic view of my chances.  

 

My big concern is the sentence 'it would need to be heavily justified as to why it is acceptable to build a new dwelling(s) in this location.'

 

 

 

[ToughButterCup]

I don't know is the straight answer.

But here's what you can do  

• Network
• Read widely
• Buy expert local advice

On BH there is a wealth of experience, read the Planning section. Then review your LPA planning website; you appear to have started that process.

Find out who the best local planning adviser is - on the basis of both evidence and recommendation. There is no substitute for legwork and hours of reading.

'....heavy justif[cation]...' can be read as a hint as well as a caution. Local expert advice will help most

 

Oh, welcome, by the way!

Ian

[Triassic]

What's an SPA exclusion zone?

[Ferdinand]

IMO you need advice from an experienced local who knows the Council policies better than the Council do. My usual suggestion is either the most experienced qualified person at an independent Estate Agency or planning consultancy (10 years local experience) or someone who has won several similar PPs locally.

 

You can do things ranging from an informal conversation for 10 minutes in the shop to half a day or a day of their time with a short report. Key things are that you have a one page brief outlining your questions and requirements for their work. My suggestion is to pay as you will then engage formal professional confidentiality etc. 

 

You will be into a quality specific design (depending on what "local listing" means and what their criteria are), potentially several expert reports (eg prove it is not in the SPA belt, archie the -ologost for graves and history, traffic etc). Could easily be 5k-10k or perhaps a lot more before you get (or are refused) PP.  I would also want funding in place for an Appeal, as you could be affected by local politics. You need to be able to afford to lose this sum. 

 

"Curtiledge of a listed dwelling" is - I suspect  rather naughty / misleading if it is only a 'noted' building in the Council records not the EH listing database. That looks like a locally wished limitation, which will be less authoritative. Check it.

 

I would say consider bungalows as a possibility too, and remember that you need to preserve the amenity of the church.

 

On finance, you may be able to fund against the plot once you have PP, or reach a deal with a developer/builder to build both / you keep one. Alternatively, given probable price increases over 5 years, equity release and a bigger mortgage on your existing property might be the way to fund it (5 year fix?).

 

I spent a couple of hours reading about the Thames SPA once, and the extra (3k?) charges to be visited on eg PPs in a chunk of Farnham. The fascinatingly awful thing was that it seems to take far less evidence to create an SPA than would justify the extra imposed costs to build a house there afterwards. I seem to recall a tiny population of woodlarks that had not actually been counted for quite a few years yet a huge piece of territory was blighted on that basis. I would love to have an update.

 

Ferdinand

 

 

Edited April 5, 2017 by Ferdinand

[Ferdinand]

52 minutes ago, Triassic said:

What's an SPA exclusion zone?

 

Special Protection Area related to the EU Birds Directive. As ever the implementation here seems extremely gold-plated.

 

The theory is that if you build within X kilometres of a sufficiently important population of certain bird species, your new development will prevent them feeding in the area (especially if they are shy birds such as woodlarks). Close to the SPA there is a presumption against development, and further away you are required to buy them alternative feeding grounds.

 

Typically things are not built within 400m of the SPA, and anything proposed within 4 miles or so is difficult and needs to argue and mitigate. It is easier for smaller developments.

 

In the area of this Planning App the mitigation cost is approx £7-8k in the form of a planning payment if you build a 3 bedroom house.

 

The doc for the area of this thread is here:

https://www.hart.gov.uk/sites/default/files/4_The_Council/Policies_and_published_documents/Planning_policy/Interim_Avoidance_Strategy_for_TBHSPA - November_2010.pdf

 

If you are potentially affected, you have to have a statement in your Planning App saying that you have thought about it.

 

It can be another tool in the NIMBY toolbox.

 

Ferdinand

 

Edited April 5, 2017 by Ferdinand

[Temp]

8 hours ago, Karl said:

The first part, regarding the exclusion zone is a mistake, I know categorically that the garden falls outside of the zone.

 

Outside the SPA zone or outside a 400m zone around the SPA?

[Karl]

Thanks everyone for all of your responses!

we are outside of the 400m exclusion zone.  This dissects the north east corner of our plot, including touching our church.

natural England (5 years ago, when we were converting the church) were fine in principle with developing as long as the development outside that part .. Which it definitely will be.

Although this was some time ago, I am fairly confident that they will give the same conclusion now.

[PeterW]

Councils are funny when it comes to boundaries and "zones" and it's not unusual for them to ignore the actual boundary of something such as an SPA and include the whole of any property in the exclusion. We had friends who built a garage / workshop in their back garden (not in Conservation zone) and found that the updated GIS plan on the council website had included it - the definitive conservation map and the order were correct but it's easy to see how these things start to blur. 

 

How will your new plots be accessed ..? May be worth fencing it off and sorting that now so when you apply for planning it's for an address unrelated to your church to distinguish the two areas. 

 

Did Natural England comment on your conversion planning application ..? If so that should still be on file and can be referenced.  

[Ferdinand]

4 hours ago, PeterW said:

Councils are funny when it comes to boundaries and "zones" and it's not unusual for them to ignore the actual boundary of something such as an SPA and include the whole of any property in the exclusion. We had friends who built a garage / workshop in their back garden (not in Conservation zone) and found that the updated GIS plan on the council website had included it - the definitive conservation map and the order were correct but it's easy to see how these things start to blur. 

 

How will your new plots be accessed ..? May be worth fencing it off and sorting that now so when you apply for planning it's for an address unrelated to your church to distinguish the two areas. 

 

Did Natural England comment on your conversion planning application ..? If so that should still be on file and can be referenced.  

 

One thing I noted in the detailed wording of the CoP linked above is that it talked about iirc "Access Point" to the plot, which could be interpreted as 'nearest point as the crow flies' (ie access for the woodlarks) or perhaps 'plot access point', which is an ambiguity which may be useable creatively if there is a dispute over inches.

[Jeremy Harris]

Councils are indeed funny about this stuff.  We're outside the village Conservation Area (CA), but because we are within 100m of a listed building we had to comply with slightly more onerous requirements than we would have had we been inside the CA.  I'm still not really sure why this bit of the village is outside the CA boundary, given it contains one of the two listed buildings in the village (the other being half a mile away from the CA).