We were contacted by our client after their recent application had been refused by Walsall Metropolitan Borough Council planning department and a decision notice had been issued to our client refusing the application.
The refusal was issued on the 4th November 2020 and as a House Holder Application, the appeal had 12 weeks from the decision notice to be submitted to the Planning Inspectorate.
Our client felt the decision was very unjustified as they feel the property is situated on a significantly oversized plot.
Additionally he felt the council was causing unnecessary expense by requesting a bat report survey and did not substantiate the reasoning as to why they needed that report during the determination process as the likelihood of bats on or around this property in this built up locality was minimal.
The client instructed us to proceed with around 8 weeks to produce the appeal documents. We always recommend leaving at least a whole clear month from instruction to appeal deadline, just in-case additional investigations are needed to strengthen any arguments, but the bottom line is the more time we have the better.
The refusal reasons given by the Walsall Metropolitan Borough Council were in three comprehensive and substantial paragraphs, starting with the two storey side extension and focusing on that the design would not be subservient, it would be too wide, it would fail to maintain symmetry of the two semi-detached properties, and therefore detrimental to the appearance of the host dwelling, street scene and character of the area.
Next Walsall Metropolitan Borough Council went on to the proposed single story rear extension, stating that there was a lack of information, that the design encroached on a neighbouring property, and as such would have a detrimental effect on the property amenity.
The third paragraph of refusal reasons related to bats and that the applicant had not provided a bat survey.
Throughout the refusal Walsall Metropolitan Borough Council quoted over 25 different policies both local and national along with various development plans and design plans that they claimed that the application was contrary to.
This refusal was very comprehensive and featured an unusually hight number of policies for this type of development and as such we suspected that many were not as relevant as they were being made out to be.
For this appeal we produced a 25 page detailed appeal statement, working our way through the delegated officers report and decision notice, policies stated, and dismantling their objections and reasons to refuse this application.
Providing a comprehensive and robust argument bringing national and local policies into play and detailed reasoning as to why the findings were wrong and in-fact this development was perfectly acceptable.
Additionally we completed a detailed amount of research to find very similar cases that the planning inspectorate had previously granted and looked to use these cases to support our argument.
As this appeal was a House Holder appeal the local authority which in this case was the Walsall Metropolitan Borough Council did not have the right of response to our appeal statement.
Further details about this case can be found on the video above.
Two Story Side and Single Storey Rear Extension Planning Appeal Walsall Borough Council
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