summer 2011
The Lammas project at Tir y Gafel, Glandwr, Pembrokeshire, is Wales’ first collective initiative based on what is now the (TAN)6 national planning guidance for sustainable rural communities. (One Planet Development).
Planning permission has been granted for nine houses (four of them in a terrace and the others as individual plots), with [...]
'Under the Sun', a Victorian terrace house in Birmingham is an outstanding example of bringing a fairly typical old building up to Passivhaus standard along with major improvements to its design and appearance. For more info – click the image
Upgrading an existing house, rather than starting from scratch and building a new one [...]
Building Control
Demolition of existing buildings is covered on the Planning Portal web site.
Basically the local authority Building Control require 6 weeks written notice (except for certain exempt buildings). They may then issue a counter notice with certain conditions attached. These are most likely to do with protecting neighbouring properties and the public. You [...]
DPCs DPMs etc.
It is important to isolate all the dry inner surfaces of a building from any outer surfaces which might absorb water and be damp. The Building Regulations cover this subject here. While some outer surfaces are designed to be totally water resistant (such as roof coverings) many other areas can absorb [...]
Have fun designing your house.
There are several worthwhile advantages if you do your own design work (or at least part of it) -
it may be the only way to get what you want you achieve a kind of creative act that you can do in very few realms of your life. you [...]
Although architects have been quite slow on learning about green design principles there has recently been a bit of a scramble to catch up and they all now claim to know about the subject. In fact most architects practices leave the technical work to architectural technicians they employ. It may pay to ask quite detailed [...]
Normally your solicitor will submit a search (covered by the Local Land Charges Act 1975) to the local authority directly before you purchase land or a property. This will include standard questions about various item such as previous planning permission, adjacent roads, rights of way, water, drains etc. Many local authorities are making this type [...]
Permissions and regulations
The two main permissions you will almost certainly require for building work are Planning Permission and Building Regulations consent.
Planning Permission deals with the overall issue of what kind of houses are permissible in which area. The planning officers are employed by the local council.
Building Regulations deal with whether the building [...]
October 2011.
What is planning permission?
Planning permission must be obtained for all new houses and for most alterations (there are a few exceptions to do with small additions such as porches).
Don’t confuse planning permission with Building Regulations approval. Building Regulations is mainly about the house being built properly, i.e. structurally sound, fairly fireproof, [...]
the Shambles in York
This is a very different matter from outline planning permission and as the name suggests, the fine details of the design are ironed out at this stage. This can in some cases be very detailed indeed. For instance, if you want to build in an existing conservation area it will [...]
What happens when the planners are not going to allow you to do something which you think is completely reasonable?
Planning mentality
It is important to understand how planners think. At the end of the day most of them want an easy life and a guaranteed salary so they tend to try to achieve [...]
Don’t confuse planning permission (either outline or detailed) with Building Regulations. Planning permission is to do with whether it is OK to build a certain kind of a building in a certain place (not to do with how well it is built). Usually people apply for outline planning permission first just to find out if [...]
