PD and prior approval rights to change from commercial to residential use are widely known about in the property industry, certainly much more so than in 2013, when first introduced. Although there are still many opportunities that might financially stack on this basis, a lot of sites do not as vendors already price-in the ‘hope value’ to their asking prices.
The need to obtain full planning in some cases for a change of use does put off a lot of SME developers who would rather stick to PD or prior approval strategies, and this in turn creates more opportunity for those developers ‘in the know’ and prepared to take on these challenges to unlock their potential.
We recently obtained full planning permission in just such a case for Leufroy, an experienced developer, in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea (RBKC), to convert roughly 3,500 sq ft of secondary office space on the upper floors of a building in Notting Hill Gate to 4 self-contained high-end apartments.
Checking for Article 4 Directions
Article 4 of the Town and Country Planning (General Permitted Development) (England) Order 2016 (‘the GPDO’) provides the legal authority for either the Secretary of State to issue a Direction under this power to withdraw PD or prior approval rights for specified changes of use. When such a Direction has been made, then prior approval or PD must be obtained before the Direction comes into force (Article 4(2)).
Therefore, if a Direction comes into force before the end of 56 days of a prior approval application, or before the agreed extension period on such an application, then the application fails automatically; even if the application was refused before 56 days expires, an appeal is submitted and the Direction comes into force before the appeal is determined.
The NPPF now sets out further tests on the use of Article 4 directions, most importantly that the Council has to be able to “robustly” justify that they are “necessary to avoid wholly unacceptable adverse impacts” and must be limited the “smallest geographical area possible” (NPPF, paragraph 53).
