Do I need planning permission?

Thurlow40

Hi all,
I live on a huge housing estate and whilst my house has a garage, there is no allocated parking spot.
The garage is en bloc and if I were to park in front of it it would prevent my neighbours accessing theirs.  As far as I know no one uses their garage for parking their car in but of course access should stay clear as any of us could do.  We all just park along the road, first come, first served.
I can access the garages out of my back gate and I have a redundant bit of patio inside my garden that my sons old toys and trampoline gets stored on but if I changed my garden fence a bit I could drive past my garage and onto the redundant patio, so effectively using some of my garden as my own drive way.  Do I need planning permission? There area is paved already and there are no curbs etc or none that would need to be dropped.  It just seems to be a change to the fence enabling me to drive into my garden.  Seems simple, is it…?

Thank you.

ThisIsWeird

Who owns the land immediately alongside the garage  that you'd need to drive over?

Section62

Thurlow40 said:

Hi all,
I live on a huge housing estate and whilst my house has a garage, there is no allocated parking spot.
The garage is en bloc and if I were to park in front of it it would prevent my neighbours accessing theirs.  As far as I know no one uses their garage for parking their car in but of course access should stay clear as any of us could do.  We all just park along the road, first come, first served.
I can access the garages out of my back gate and I have a redundant bit of patio inside my garden that my sons old toys and trampoline gets stored on but if I changed my garden fence a bit I could drive past my garage and onto the redundant patio, so effectively using some of my garden as my own drive way.  Do I need planning permission? There area is paved already and there are no curbs etc or none that would need to be dropped.  It just seems to be a change to the fence enabling me to drive into my garden.  Seems simple, is it…?

Thank you.

You need to check the planning consent when the development was built (and for any modifications to your property) to see what it says about the garden and parking arrangements.

In planning terms you would be gaining an extra car parking space and losing a portion of your garden.  It is possible the planning consent used conditions to restrict the number car parking spaces and/or protected the gardens from further development, so you need to find out whether conditions like this apply to your property.

silvercar

If you own the fence, unless your deeds say otherwise, you can remove it. 

Once removed you could do what you want until someone objects and takes action. If that takes a long time you may have established rights to do so by then.

Thurlow40

Thanks everybody.  I have attached a picture to add some context.  The paved area you see inside the painted fence is mine, the arch/entry way to the garages is along the right beside the door you can see to the maisonette.  In my mind I can change my fence to follow the line of the grass in my garden and then just leave the paved area open to drive into?  I don’t know who owns the land, council I guess.  It’s an old Bovis homes development.

ThisIsWeird

I struggle to see any obvious issues with that.

Your deeds will almost certainly outline the right-of-way you have over that tarmac'd section in order to get to your garage, so it doesn't look as tho' you'll be encroaching over any more land than that to get through your fence.

Will you be fitting gates instead? And will your car come fully on to that patio section?

Problems may arise if someone complains that you are taking/using land that ain't yours, for example if your car sticks out on to the tarmac.

Section62

ThisIsWeird said:

I struggle to see any obvious issues with that.

Your deeds will almost certainly outline the right-of-way you have over that tarmac'd section in order to get to your garage, so it doesn't look as tho' you'll be encroaching over any more land than that to get through your fence.

It depends whether there is a strip of land between the RoW and the OP's garden - only the deeds will contain that information.

There's also the potential planning issue, maybe covenants too.

I also wouldn't drive a car onto/over those inspection chamber covers without checking they are suitable for wheel loading.

Thurlow40

Thank you, there isn’t a strip of land. It’s extremely tight out there! There is a path that leads up to to the houses on the left but it ends before you get to my fence and then just becomes the tarmac in front of the garages. 

Section62

Thurlow40 said:

Thank you, there isn’t a strip of land. It’s extremely tight out there! There is a path that leads up to to the houses on the left but it ends before you get to my fence and then just becomes the tarmac in front of the garages. 

Bear in mind if the strip (if there is one) won't necessarily be visible on the ground, the surface may look exactly the same as the tarmac in front of the garages.

See "ransom strip" - although this is commonly used to refer to land retained by the owner when they sell another parcel of land, it can also include cases where the land is leased, or rights (e.g. RoW) are given.

TELLIT01

I assume the gates would open inwards, in which case you may have problems getting a decent sized car far enough forward to be able to close the gates.  Opening out wouldn't be practical as it could potentially obstruct access to the nearest garage.

casper_gutman

A house near me has bifold driveway gates, which helps get round the problem of having limited space for the gates to swing and needing to avoid outward opening (which in this case, would block the pavement).

In practice I doubt outward opening gates would cause an issue in the OP's case as long as they were only opened briefly for access. I'd assumed the nearest garage was the OP's anyway - but admittedly I can't see this stated explicitly so it's probably worth clarifying.