The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Smallholding => Buildings & planning => Topic started by: Bionic on February 05, 2013, 01:34:51 pm
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I think there is mixed advice about whether pp is required or not but as I like to do things by the book I decided to do the right thing and ask the local council office.
I sent an email on 4th Jan. They responded same day with the name of the person who would be dealing with the query and the time frame within which I would receive a reply (10 business days).
Todate I haven't heard from them. I have tried phoning the person in question and he always seems to be out of the office.
So much for being law abiding :rant: :rant:
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Planning permission is normally required for a commercial polytunnel a normal household size one you do not require it. If you holding is over 5ha you can apply for the tunnel under permitted development provided you have not undertaken any building with in 90 meters of the proposed site within the last 2 yrs.
If you have less then 5ha then you will need full planning permission.
However if the proposed site is within the boundary of you garden and it is not commercial polytunnel or a large domestic size one then no PP is needed as they are normally free standing. If you are going to concrete in the base of even a small polytunnel this may be classed as development and may well require PP but you will need to check with your local planning office.
WE applied for PP under permitted development for ours and had no problems our is a commercial one 30ft by 100ft asnd now after 2 yrs find that it is not enough.
Hope this helps.
Tala
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Thanks Tala
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it also depends on curtalage etc
we have to pay to ask advice on planning now... ::)
our polytunnel is an average one at 20x14
could do with more :excited: :excited:
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No use on polytunnels but we were due to receive a planning decision on our planning application 3 weeks ago (target decision date 8 weeks after application, now 11 weeks on and ticking). We know they had no objections from the neighbours and the parish council gave a big thumbs up and there didn't seem to be any major problems when they came for the site visit but still no decision. Ho hum.
H
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Your situation is probably way out of my situation, hope this helps to some degree :fc:
I contacted our council for our allotment ( garden at the back of the house ) and was told they hadn't classified them yet so brought them under greenhouse regs 12ft x 10ft max.
The councillor for allotments could not give a proper classification so I guess I could have fought a bigger unit. She did, however, talk me through the regulations and what I could have and what was definitely not allowed. I think each council borough must have their own regs, this may be true for private or agricultural land too, so I would keep on the good side and make contact with the respective councillor. I have found them more helpful if you try to stay within the regulations and sort things out in person or speaking to them.
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But it is in Carmarthenshire and the Council seems to be in a world of its own
see
http://carmarthenplanning.blogspot.co.uk/2013/01/another-planning-problem.html (http://carmarthenplanning.blogspot.co.uk/2013/01/another-planning-problem.html)
the blog is by a rather brave lady who has single handedly been trying to expose the Council. The blog is an eye opening read.
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Thats interesting henchard.
Strange but having written my rant on here I received a response (perhaps the planners are TAS members)
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Polytunnels are temporary structures however, in order to be considered temporary (and thereby not require planning permission) they would need to not be located on the spot for more than 28 days in the year. If the intention is to permanently situate the polytunnel on the site then it will need to be justified for agriculture or forestry purposes.
unquote
Anyone here take their polytunnel down for 28 days?
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It just goes to show that some people working in LPA's have no idea of how things work, from the answer they seem to have mixed up two different parts of the legislation, firstly there is no requirement for temporary structures to be moved every 28 days or to be taken down if that were so then all the field shelters would be rolling round the countryside like Webbles. As for raising and lowering a polytunnel that is just laughable :roflanim:.
Who in their right mind would dream up such an answer.
But on a serious note if you have a large holding and you are going to not only feed your family but others from your polytunnel I would put in a Permitted Developement Application cost £80.00. As it is necessary to agriculture and is part of your horticultural business.
Tala
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Tala, we only have 2.35 acres so definitely not large. I would use the poly tunnel for veg for us and any animals i.e. pigs when we get our next weaners.
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It just goes to show that some people working in LPA's have no idea of how things work, from the answer they seem to have mixed up two different parts of the legislation, firstly there is no requirement for temporary structures to be moved every 28 days or to be taken down if that were so then all the field shelters would be rolling round the countryside like Webbles. As for raising and lowering a polytunnel that is just laughable :roflanim: .
Who in their right mind would dream up such an answer.
But on a serious note if you have a large holding and you are going to not only feed your family but others from your polytunnel I would put in a Permitted Developement Application cost £80.00. As it is necessary to agriculture and is part of your horticultural business.
Tala
Some councils do indeed require temp structures (mainly horse field shelters) to be moved regularly and in the most extreme cases every 28 days. In some cases they even cannot return to the same place twice.
However that is mainly cos they don't want them there at all. Other structures are usually deemed temporary unless they are concreted in/on a concrete base, ESP if like a poly tunnel they have a finite life without maintenance.
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I've had the tunnel frame up for almost a year without any problems from planners so far, but it doesn't have a cover on it yet as its not fenced off from the ponies, its sixty feet long and 24 ft wide (and i have the grumpiest neighbour ever!)
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I've had the tunnel frame up for almost a year without any problems from planners so far, but it doesn't have a cover on it yet as its not fenced off from the ponies, its sixty feet long and 24 ft wide (and i have the grumpiest neighbour ever!)
Diito size except ours is fully covered and been up for 6yrs, never applied for planning and even when the planners came to see about the shed they never commented on it! Unfortunaely you're on their radar now so you can't put one up and plead ignorance to the rules :innocent:
mandy :pig:
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Dont ever mention to the planners you want it to house animals :)
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Baz, thanks for the advice but I don't intend to house animals in it. Although now that you have mentioned it :thinking: :roflanim:
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WE don't house animals in our tunnel however we have now got two robins in residence does this count?
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I have mine in the garden and never thought I would need planning. Been up 5 years now. We get frogs using it in the winter time which cleans up slugs.
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Just fallen foul myself. I am under the 5 ha level and would need permission for anything on my land next to garden . Wanted to put up a 64 m square poly and they want to charge me 400 quid for the application. Absolutely ludicrous .
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We have just under 5 hectares and so needed to have full planning. Actually the neighbours are so foul that, even if we had 5 hectares, the planners would have had to call it in as there was so much hysteria. We won but it took six months of vitriol from the neighbours.
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I saw the title and immediately thought Carmarthenshire CC - they are a nightmare. I never knew about the blog!
I did what they always say you should, arranged a meeting, (no charge thankfully) said what I planned and hoped to do, and in every case was told I need full PP (less than 5ha) and that he would refuse!!!!!
I have a polytunnel, yet to be put up in our lower field, a field shelter that has been stuck in the same spot for a couple of years now, and wanted to offer yurt/camping in our top field which has lovely views.
His response was that yurts would require change of use and we wouldn't get that outside the development line - who wants a yurt in their garden, who'd want to stay there?! The polytunnel would also need planning (got to have feet concreted in) as would the field shelter unless it was moved however often. Thing is I probably wouldn't get permission for the field shelter as there are houses nearby in all directions and animal housing has to be 400m from domestic dwellings I think.
I'm hoping to get round all this as planning fees are ridiculous, and neighbours would totally object, by renting enough land close by to take me past the 5 hectares so I only need to do the 28 Day Notice under Permitted Development.
Fingers crossed eh?!
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FK, yes fingers crossed for you :fc:
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FK that sounds a nifty plan. What happens if you then give up the rented land, could they make you remove it?
We are lucky here, having a lot of land is a headache in many ways but the one thing it does make a lot easier is this sort of thing. Have just put up a lambing/horse mobile shelter and know that it's fine (even have proper wheels for it not just skids but even if they were awkward, cos its for lambing and sheep winter shelter mainly and we are over 5ha by a long way, we could always say fine we will concrete it in under 28 day notice....:-)))
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I hate to say it but if the neighbours object, it could be called in anyway, more than 5h or not.
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But since no one can see it from their house they would find it quite tricky to argue their case :-))))
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In our case, people complained because it could be seen from the road! It seems that other people have rights over views over your land. :-\
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In our case, people complained because it could be seen from the road! It seems that other people have rights over views over your land. :-\
Thankfully we aren't on a road either, a mile up a private track...:-)))) phew. But since the place can be seen distantly from a footpath, we would try to site it sensitively (we also paint all of the wooden buildings, stables, field shelters etc dark green, it costs quite a bit to do but they really do blend in much more from a distance)
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We had to put a hedge in . As we were going to do that anyway and we no more wish to see other people than they us, it was no big deal. Just took 6 months to get permission. In the end it took the District Councillor to come and say' It's an agricultural building on agricultural land. Where's the problem?' for the planners to give in. Round here, bad feeling was caused by a huge number of tunnels on a site in Herefordshire and since then, everyone's needed permission. Not every Council demands it.
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If you have over 5 hectares and put in for 'permitted development' permission for your polytunnel/storage barn etc - so long as the planning dept are happy it meets all the criteria (things like type of materials being used, siting within the land - usually near to other buildings etc, and at least 400m from the nearest neighbours house if it is to house animals, and the biggest one - that there is an actual need for it) - the neighbours can't say anything. In fact they wouldn't even probably know about it as the council don't put up notices for permitted development applications and they have only 28 days from receipt to approve it or come back to you to say it needs full planning permission because it doesn't meet the criteria.
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That's what I'm banking on LA, no signs up on my lamppost, it will all be done and dusted before anyone else knows about it!
I need the polytunnel to extend the season and grow my high value produce, in fact grow anything in this part of Wales. It is going to be sited in the most sheltered/sunny/flat part of the field, not close to our outbuildings but it's the only suitable location for it. It will be pretty close to and easily visible from my less than pleasant neighbours, and from a public footpath, although I do intend to improve the existing hedge - bit bare in places and a lot is deciduous so useless in winter! But no animals will be housed in it so that sorts that out.
Not sure what happens if we don't keep the rented land, LaM but if that happened I'd have about 60 pigs to find room for so that wouldn't be my first concern lol!
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We looked into renting extra land to take us over the 5 hectare limit but on the planning information, it said you had to have an agreement to rent for 10 years so that put us off that route.
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I’ve just done one, and the planners were dreadful, but I got there in the end.
If you are a farm (I am) then you need to follow the prior notification system, it is very simple and easy, do your own scale drawings by hand and do not let them tell you to get architects drawings, you don’t need them and neither do they! (sore point with me).
Phone the planners every day and communicate by email and they will give in in the end, but they can be obstructive in the extreme and every day they invent a new rule, it is useful to ask them the part of the legislation that any particular rule comes from, as you’ll find most of the blocking techniques are made by self-invention and as such not permissible, but you need to be firm and polite and level toned in your discussions and you will wear them down in the end.
I could rant for hours about my experience, but better not, so good luck and although frustrating it should not take too long.