How Effective is Planning Enforcement?
How can we make it work better?
Planning enforcement is important. Unless it’s done effectively, the integrity of the whole planning system is put at risk. But it’s one of the most frustrating issues for civic societies and local community groups. We’ll discuss this and related issues at this Open Meeting on 29th June. Please book here
Cases typically include:
- Large developments that grossly fail to meet planning conditions or even submitted drawings and plans;
- Illegal demolitions;
- Unauthorised residential alterations and extensions;
- Additional floors built on top of blocks [more…]
Planning for Telecoms Masts
Most of us now carry smart phones around with us all the time: they have become an essential part of modern life. For most of the time when we are out and about, using our phones depends on signals from telecoms masts. Since the first dozen masts were erected by Vodafone in 1985 to cover London and the M4 corridor, they have become ubiquitous across the country. In London alone there are estimated to be some 7,000 of the monopole masts we see on streets and the tops [more…]
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Barriers to historic building retrofit
A New Grosvenor report warns that England’s three million listed buildings and conservation area homes are being trapped in cold, costly decline by an outdated planning system
Local authorities spend the equivalent of 4,000 working days a year approving low-risk energy efficiency works that are almost always consented anyway
Retrofitting listed properties and buildings in conservation areas in England and Wales could deliver around 30% of the annual emissions reductions needed to meet the UK’s Sixth Carbon Budget.
Our new Resources page has some useful retrofit [more…]
Chief Planner’s update
The MHCLG Chief Planner, Johanna Averley (pictured), has issued a newsletter to local authority planners. It covers a Modernised Planning Committees consultation and speeding up build-out with Completion Notices, a Delayed Homes Penalty and Compulsory Purchase Orders, as in a recent Working Paper and Technical Consultation.
The Government proposed Planning and Infrastructure Bill amendments to remove the statutory requirement to consult in the pre-application stage for NSIP applications.
DEFRA is consulting on options for how Biodiversity Net Gain (BNG) should be applied and MHCLG issued a related Working [more…]
Permitted development homes could be uninhabitable
Insurer Zurich UK has warned that office-to-residential conversions introduced in 2013 must be done properly or they will be uninhabitable for the future. Housing does not need to meet building regulations where there is a ‘material change of use’. The report details the serious problems found. 89,500 homes have been developed from commercial buildings and the lifting of a size cap on office-to-residential conversions in March led to applications increasing by 20% in England in a year.
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How Effective is Planning Enforcement?
📆 Mon 29th June | 18:30 - 20:30
🚩 77 Cowcross Street, EC1M 6EL (map)
How can we make it work better? Planning enforcement is important. Unless it’s done effectively, the integrity of the whole planning system is put at risk. But it’s one of the most frustrating issues for civic societies and local community groups. We’ll discuss this and related issues at this Open Meeting on 29th June. Please book here ( https://www.londonforum.org.uk/events/how-effective-is-planning-enforcement#booking ) Cases typically include: Large developments that grossly fail to meet planning conditions or even submitted drawings and plans; Illegal demolitions; Unauthorised residential alterations and extensions; Additional floors…