New SPD on Residential Extensions and Alterations will make it easier to extend Brent residences

 

A new supplementary planning document on residential alterations and extensions will come into force on January 25th 2025 following its approval by Muhammed Butt in his role as Lead Member as well as Brent Council leader.

The aim is to ease the housing pressures by enabling easier extensions to houses and it also contains recommendations on flooding and biodiversity:

The Residential Extensions and Alterations Supplementary Planning Document (SPD) is consistent with the priorities of the Borough Plan in a number of respects. In relation to the Prosperity and Stability in Brent priority it supports existing residents to meet their housing needs better by enabling them to extend their home more easily to meet their needs than in current guidance. This removes the need to purchase larger more costly homes and the associated moving costs. In relation to the Cleaner, Greener Future priority it seeks to ensure that existing green space, trees, plants and biodiversity is retained as much as possible in development and where possible additional provision is made. It is supportive of incorporation of renewable energy and low carbon space heating sources. It seeks to ensure development avoids areas of flood risk and addressed any additional surface water run-off created by retaining it on site.

 

In relation to the Best Start in Life priority, the ability of occupiers to more easily extend their homes should reduce the potential for over-crowding. It will allow for the opportunity for children to have separate bedrooms, with the associated benefits to sleep/ health and educational attainment. This also feeds into the Healthier Brent priority, as does the need to retain sufficient garden space/ green space which is known to be beneficial to physical and mental health as well as the measures to reduce the effects of climate change which will also be beneficial to health. Providing space may also allow carers  to live in properties to support occupants with a chronic health issue or disability.

 

EXTRACTS

Biodiversity

 

Regardless of any exemptions, you are encouraged to increase the biodiversity of your property by planting trees and flowering plants, retaining areas of long grass, nettles or overgrowth, introducing water features (ponds, bird baths etc) and creating a compost heap. You are also encouraged to include other measures not necessarily addressed by Biodiversity Net Gain (BNG), such as Swift bricks, bat and bird boxes and holes in fences for hedgehogs. These are particularly important where features that provide habitats are lost, such as old structures with holes and crevices. Useful information on how to approach this can be found on the Woodland Trust website, and elsewhere.

 

 

Flooding

 

Impermeable hard landscaping with poor drainage can help cause flooding within the borough.

 

You are encouraged to address surface water flooding issues through the provision of natural features, such as rain gardens or green roofs, and by not connecting the drainage of any new hard landscaping to the existing sewer network.

 

If your extension or outbuilding is proposed within an area of surface water flooding, as shown on the Brent Local Plan policies map, you will have to amend your planning application accordingly. You will need professional advice to provide information to support your application, generally in the form of a Flood Risk Assessment. Key factors to consider include the depth and speed of the surface water during flood periods, and the volume of water that could be displaced by your extension or outbuilding.

 

Dimensions of extensions

 

 

Depth

 

For attached homes, such as terraced or semi-detached homes, single storey rear extensions could be up to 6 metres in depth from the original rear wall of your home.

 

For detached homes, single storey rear extensions could be up to 8 metres in depth from the original rear wall of your home.

 

Notwithstanding the above, the depth of single storey rear extensions must not be more than half the length of your garden. The area (sqm) of your garden that is retained should meet the relevant amenity space standards, as set out in Brent Local Plan Policy BH13.

 

Height

 

 Single storey rear extensions up to 3 metres in depth for an attached home, or up to 4 metres in depth for a detached home, could be up to 4 metres in height as long as they have an eaves height of no more than 3

metres.

 

A maximum height of up to 4 metres could be acceptable, for example, where the extension has either a mono-pitched or pitched roof.

 

Single storey rear extensions more than 3 metres in depth for an attached home, or more than 4 metres in depth for a detached home, could also be up to 4 metres in height as long as they have an eaves height of no more than 2.5 metres along the boundary to any neighbouring properties.

 

A height of up to 4 metres could be acceptable, for example, where the extension has a pitched roof

 

PLEASE DO NOT RELY ON THE EXTRACTS FOR GUIDANCE. THE FULL DOCUMENT IS HERE.

 

'Delay South Kilburn Masterplan until community has reviewed it,' request Granville and Carlton users

Leslie Barson and Deirdre Woods, representing the users of South Kilburn's Granville and Carlton Centres are unable to attend tonight's Cabinet meeting which will consider the Masterplan Supplementary Planning Document. They have submitted the following comments for consideration by the Cabinet and a request that the Cabinet delay acceptance of the plan to enable the community to review what should be their plan.

The South Kilburn Masterplan Supplementary Planning Document (SPD) is over 180 pages long over 3 sections. The people from South Kilburn were given 6 weeks to comment on this document which lays out the plans for their homes, parks, health, education, small businesses, and community services in the area for the next 10 -15 years. Each site is given 2 A4 pages in the document. The first half of the page gives the details about where the property is with the second half of the same page incorporating a short paragraph about each of these three issues: ‘Description’, ‘Justification’ and ‘Design Principles’. The second page gives a vague shadow drawing of a huge block or blocks in the place of the current buildings. 

1.   Firstly this is not an adequate amount of time or information for the community to read, understand , digest  and examine the implications of such a massive plan. This can be seen by the small number of community responses to the SPD. Surely changes of this magnitude cannot be accepted on the basis of numbers of responses  in double figures when there are over 8000 people living in the area?

2.   Secondly, all the buildings in the chapter called ‘Site Specific Principles’  are to be replaced with new buildings.  Much of the plans arguments for this demolition are simplistic and debatable such as there is a lack of clarity about what is the front or the back of the property” (Crane and Zangwill) or the property “is currently in a prominent gateway position and the current development does not capitalise on this” (William Dunbar and William Saville Houses). This needs to be properly examined, each building on its own merit, before lives are disrupted for years and changed forever.

3.   Thirdly, you are deciding on Monday 19 June 2017 that this SPD replaces the one was developed over some years WITH the South Kilburn Community and then voted on. How can a plan created by the Council and its consultants replace a plan voted on by residents? The 2005 SPD may need updating with changes to law occurring since the first was voted on but the scale and magnitude of the changes make this SPD beyond all recognition of the SK residents plan

                                                                                                             

Therefore I ask the Cabinet to please delay the acceptance of this plan and help support the community  to review THEIR 2005 Masterplan in a long term in-depth manner as befits a document of this size and importance and with such huge ramification for the residents of South Kilburn.

Leslie Barson and Deirdre Woods representing the Users of Granville and Carlton