Decking Planning Permission (for beginners!)

[EvilDonut]

I'm currently planning a decking project that will need planning permission on two grounds - it will be higher than 300mm and will cover almost all of the garden area (so way more than the 50% rule)

I'm fine with the construction aspects of it, however I've never done anything like apply for Planning Permission, and at the moment the whole thing is putting me off a bit! I was hoping to get some advice from people with a bit more experience than me with this, ideally people who have applied for decking PP before!

Here are some specific questions:
1) Should we contact the neighbours before the PP application just to see if they agree with the plan?

2) What supporting documents would I need to include with the application? (like maps - what format/scale?

3) Is there any (preferably free) software that can help me prepare a nice 3d garden plan including the new decking?

4) Is there any (pref. free) software to help me prepare the maps I need to submit in the application?

5) If there is a problem with my application, like a neighbour rejects it or I make a minor mistake in the application and they reject it on a technicality (is that a risk by the way?), will I need to pay the £150 fee again, or is it free/a reduced fee the second time round?

6) Has anyone had a decking (or similar) application accepted/rejected? If so, any tips?

My decking design would be a three-tier deck (as the garden slopes) measuring 3.6m (the width of the house) by 5.5m (the length of the garden). The highest tier would be level with the house back door, which is 1.0m above ground level, and would extend an existing concrete staircase out from the property by 90cm. This part of the deck will overlook one of our neighbours gardens slightly, but we can already see in completely because of the existing stairs.

Tier two is around 60cm and should not result in any more overlooking (as it is on the opposite side of the garden to the previously mentioned neighbour, and the already fairly high wall prevents overlooking.

Tier three is ground level and should not be a problem, aside from the fact it covers most of the garden area.

Thanks!

 

[freddiemercurystwin]

You should contact your neighbours and see if they are OK with your proposals. Of course this may work against you as you will be bringing your application to their attention. If they have no objections you can ask them to write letters of support in favour.

For the purposes of submitting an application there's nowt wrong with hand drawn scale drawings @ 1:50. You'll need an existing and proposed plan, for the existing you'll need to show your boundary and the outline of your house. Add some levels as these will be relevant when you add the decking onto a 'proposed' plan maybe include the heights of any boundary walls/fences/hedges.

If you want to play about with various ideas Google Sketchup is free and easy and ideal for your purposes. You can generate 2D drawings for inclusion into an application but with the free version its a bit of a pain as mentioned hand drawn is fine.

You will need to submit a 'location plan' scale is normally 1:1250. Will cost about £10-12 online from one of many suppliers eg http://www.planningportal.gov.uk/planning/applications/plans There are 'ways' to get a free map but frankly for the sake of a tenner its just not worth messing around.

If your application gets returned because it was incomplete (invalid) you just re-submit it.

If your application gets rejected you can re-submit it under the same fee. But you should be talking to the planning officer during the application process to assess their stance and if they are minded to approve it or not and making any revisions to the submitted drawings to ensure it gets approved along the way.

You can submit the whole lot online nowadays via the Planning Portal http://www.planningportal.gov.uk/planning/ as well as track its progress during the application, any objection letters will appear online too.

You should check on your Local Authority's website for any peculiarities your LA may have for instance one near me expects any trees of a certain height within a certain distance to be indicated otherwise the app will just be marked invalid. The person responsible for validating your application is just an admin bod ticking boxes.

 

[EvilDonut]

Great stuff, thanks!

I've been playing with Google Sketchup for the last couple of hours and although it was a pain at first I'm getting the hang of it now, here's what I've got so far: (I'm the middle house. Note this isn't to exact scale, also the walls are stepped down towards the end of the garden so the overlooking is slightly worse than these images would suggest )

Untitled

• EvilDonut
• 21 Mar 2012
• 1

Untitled

• EvilDonut
• 21 Mar 2012
• 1

I've spoken to the council planning dept and they say there would be a site visit and a consultation period with neighbours with the main concern being privacy. They say no building control is necessary too unless the deck reaches first floor height. Neither the website nor the phone call told me of any peculiarities with rules.

I don't really know my neighbours well but at least I'm not on bad terms with any of them But yep I should probably contact them before applying, even though it might draw my application to their attention. Would they automatically get a letter in the post explaining what was happening after I applied?

1:50 - is that about A4? What kind of accuracy would be expected there? And how much annotation would you put on it? I have a to-scale A5-size drawing now with pretty much every single measurement of the proposed decking, but thats for construction purposes...I guess I'd need a more zoomed-out overview of the whole property for the application.

A tenner isnt bad at all for the location plan, I'll definitely do that

Cheers!