Planning Application - Valid grounds for objection ?

ormus

your best bet is to stick with the 2 storey maximum if poss. then the developers may decide it aint worth the carrot.
you do come across as a nimby. and that aint good for objecting to PP.
as the previous use was for business useage, its hard to object to another business on the same site.

ailuro2

We had a similar issue, but it was stopping ohuses getting built across the road from us on a steep slope. The orginal builders, 40 years ago, had thought it poor ground to build on so it was left as grass for the kids to play on.

Our view would be ruined,and we would be facing into their bedroom windows, but that doesn't matter, you need to find a real safety issue to get anywhere, in our case we are next to a school with attached nursery and the houses would limit visibility of traffic coming round a bend next to the school entrance. We went down to the planning meeting, said our piece, and the planning application was thrown out unanimously by the commitee.

The applicants appealed to the Scottish office, along came a 'suit with a clipboard' on a day when the schools and nursery was off on holiday, took a little look and said it was fine to go ahead and build on aforementioned steep hill.

We are now waiting and hoping the downturn will mean it's even less worth building than it was before, but the land has been sold on to a developer, so something will likely come of it. Money is a great motivator for companies.

planning_officer

Several points to make here - I note from the agent's supporting statement that an application for housing was refused and dismissed at appeal in 2004 due to an oversupply of housing in the area - interesting! Seems like housing is a no-go so they are trying with another type of development.

As the layout and the access have already been approved under the outline application it's pointless objecting to those matters. The reserved matters that this current application seeks permission for are scale, appearance and landscaping. In terms of scale, the care home building at the back of the site in my opinion is of a very poor design. It has a very high eaves height, a uniform eaves and ridge height with no attempt made to break up the bulk of the building or step the roofline at various heights. It creates a huge dominant block with very little elevational relief and is of a bland and featureless design. The appearance of it (in terms of materials, elevational tretments, windows etc) does little to reduce the overall scale. In addition, the large expanse of flat crown roof adds to the bulk and is indicative of the poor design and the applicant's intent of putting the largest building possible there. Although the previous outline application granted permission for a part 2 storey, part 3 storey building - none of this building is 2 storey (it's all 3 storey with a couple of small single storey bits) and if I'm not mistaken there is a small 4 storey part in the middle too. In my opinion the scale and appearance are highly objectionable. Quote Central Government advice from PPS1 at the Council: "good design should contribute positively to making places better for people. Design which is inappropriate in its context or which fails to take the opportunities available for improving the character and quality of an area and the way it functions should not be accepted."

Paragraph 6.12 of the agent's planning statement says that "the scale, bulk and massing has been broken up considerably by the shape of the building and the detailed articulation of the principal elevations which also add visual interest." What utter crap!! He fails to mention the uniform ridge height, the high eaves height also at a uniform height and the bland elevational treatment.


Also, the care home building would be of such a large scale that it could well appear dominant and visually intrusive when seen from the neighbouring residential properties to the west.


Also, and very importantly, I can't see how this can be a valid reserved matters appplication - the layout of the children's nursery is completely different to the layout approved under the outline!! I would be concerned about the 2 storey depth of the nursery extending parallel to the neighbouring garden at 25 Deansgate Lane - that is likely to look pretty overbearing.


Hope those points help!

Edit: Just noticed that para 3.1 of the agent's planning statement says that the siting of the nursery was not approved under the previous application, even though to me it looks better than the current application! As the council's website doesn't have the decision notice or committee report for the previous application, it's impossible to see what the objections were!

rocky_robin

Woby_Tide wrote: »

Unless the garden centre was completely rubbish i imiagine there was traffic going in and out fairly regularly (and being a garden centre 7 days a week)

Why do you think they've sold the land ? Basically the guy inherited the business which had been passed down through the family for 100 years and thought blow this, I can make more money by selling it.
Barring Sunday mornings there were rarely more than 1 or 2 cars visiting the site

rocky_robin

planning_officer wrote: »

I would be concerned about the 2 storey depth of the nursery extending parallel to the neighbouring garden at 25 Deansgate Lane - that is likely to look pretty overbearing.

Some really useful points, cheers for that,I was thinking along similar lines but wasn't sure how to phrase it.

One of the problems we have with the objection is that the residents of 25 and 29 Deansgate Lane were the owners of the land and have therefore not objected.Not sure that they have thought of the long term issues of selling the properties at a future date once the development has been built!

Apologies to those who think I sound like Victor Meldrew, it's just been quite stressful having decided 12 months ago not to move and now having another baby on the way (and yes we have considered that the children's nursery could be a bonus on our doorstep !)

rocky_robin

planning_officer wrote: »

As the council's website doesn't have the decision notice or committee report for the previous application, it's impossible to see what the objections were!

Minutes of the Planning Meting (brief though they are) are here

http://www.trafford.gov.uk/cme/live/dynamic/DemServMeeting.asp?id=0&meeting_id=374AF3D6-4A85-4364-BB0B-78979EA91F11

WobblyGoblin

planning_officer: compelled to say "great post". You've taken a fair bit of time, by the looks of it, to analyse rocky_robin's problem and given him some great advice.

I hope the next time I have a problem I can find someone as helpful as you.

rocky_robin

WobblyGoblin wrote: »

planning_officer: compelled to say "great post". You've taken a fair bit of time, by the looks of it, to analyse rocky_robin's problem and given him some great advice.

I hope the next time I have a problem I can find someone as helpful as you.

I agree wholeheartedly and these comments will supplement my own concerns about the proximity,size and scale of the children's nursery and the appearance/affect on visual amenity

Thanks Again

planning_officer

Thanks all! I suppose being in the job of looking at plans like these every day, I get used to picking fault with developments like this!!

And thanks for the link to the Committee minutes - you're right, they're very brief!! The Council seem a bit slack for not posting the Committee report on the website - at my LPA it's put online a week before the committee and remains online permanently thereafter. Anyway, I'm still not really any wiser as to what the Councillors previous concerns were regarding the layout of the nursery building. I see a condition was attached to the outline permission stating that approval of the siting of the nursery was required under the reserved matters application. However, I think the siting was better as shown for the outline application rather than the current one - for the entire two storey section of the building to extend along the whole depth of No. 25 is pretty awful visually. They've got a narrow single storey bit nearest to the boundary but that doesn't change the fact that the 2 storey section would be very overbearing and intrusive when seen from the rear windows and garden of No. 25.

Also, even if the owners of No. 25 haven't objected, shouldn't make any difference as any decent planning officer should be able to see that it's a poor relationship. The only thing I would be worried about is that you say the plans have been drawn up after seeking informal advice from the planning officers - I hope they haven't given an informal thumbs up to this development! If it is granted it would be a very poor decision in my opinion. Good luck though!

rocky_robin

planning_officer wrote: »

Also, even if the owners of No. 25 haven't objected, shouldn't make any difference as any decent planning officer should be able to see that it's a poor relationship. The only thing I would be worried about is that you say the plans have been drawn up after seeking informal advice from the planning officers - I hope they haven't given an informal thumbs up to this development! If it is granted it would be a very poor decision in my opinion. Good luck though!

The irony being that the occupants of number 25 are the first to object to anything else planned on the road !

The majority of the applicants documents do make references to discussions held with 2 planning officers dealing with the application, prior to it being submitted.
The same actions were taken with regard to the road layout/mini roundabout whereby informal discussions/advice appear to have been taken from the council highways department.

I feel there is an informal thumbs up already in place but we'll see

Final minutes of the meeting are found here
http://www.trafford.gov.uk/cme/live/dynamic/DocMan2Document.asp?id=0&document_id=03805B49-65D9-4F06-9CB7-4C8B2A977A97