Things are improving at Waltham Forest Council. About 10 years ago, it had a reputation for being very negative towards planning applications and very quick to refuse permission – about a third of applications were refused, sometimes on very weak grounds.
In recent years, the council has become more open to development. Its new Local Plan has planning policies that are less restrictive than they used to be and the council approved 78% of the applications it received last year, according to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government.
That does not mean it gets everything right. It still refuses some applications unfairly, and objects to certain types of developments in particular, such as dormer roof extensions.
If you have been refused permission by Waltham Forest, do not assume that they must have reached the right decision. Take a close look at your decision notice and the reasons for refusal, and also consider whether it is worth submitting a planning appeal.
Why planning applications are refused in Waltham Forest
Waltham Forest is a borough under significant development pressure. It has a fast growing population, has had rapidly increasing house prices and the council has seen its planning budgets slashed in recent years.
This puts pressure on case officers, who are cautious, especially about what they see are ‘over-development’, where a building is too large and takes up too much of a site, or where an extension involves changes to the appearance of a building, additional bulk or perceived impact on neighbouring properties.
It is also common for very limited weight to be given to similar developments nearby, particularly where those developments were approved some time ago or under different planning policies.
Case officers are, of course, entitled to reach whatever decision they believe to be right. But subjective assessments are open to challenge, and an appeal is often the best way to get a decision reviewed by an independent third party.
A Waltham Forest bugbear – larger home extensions
Every council planning team has its own culture and a tendency to be negative about certain types of proposal. The planners at Waltham Forest seem to have a particular dislike of larger home extensions.
Larger home extensions are single-storey rear extensions built under permitted development rights but to a depth greater than the usual permitted development limits. For example, a rear extension to a terraced house can be three metres deep under permitted development, but up to six metres deep under the larger home extension scheme.
Although larger home extensions are permitted development, you must still apply for prior approval. If neighbours do not object, prior approval is not needed but if any neighbour does object to the proposal, the council assesses the extension on its likely impact on neighbours.
Although this was intended by the government to be a light-touch type of development, Waltham Forest has been quick to refuse applications where a neighbour has complained. It generally views deeper extensions as causing an overbearing impact and a loss of light or outlook, even where the proposal complies with the depth and height limits set out in permitted development legislation.
These decisions are particularly vulnerable to challenge at appeal and we have a high success rate, including recent examples we have written about on Millfield Road, in Walthamstow, and on Sinclair Road, in Chingford.
Waltham Forest also dislikes dormers
The council is also resistant to larger dormer extensions, often describing them as bulky, dominant or out of keeping with the host property and the wider street.
In practice, the council tends to argue that dormers are too big, spanning too much of the roof, interrupting the rhythm of a terrace or pair of houses or eroding what the council considers to be a uniform roofline. These concerns are commonly framed in terms of harm to character and appearance, even where dormers are already a feature of the surrounding area.
In the last couple of years, we have found that appeal inspectors are showing much more flexibility about proposals for dormers, and we now have a high success rate at appeal for dormers. Although box dormers are large and, if we are completely honest, sometimes quite ugly, they are usually permitted development (though not in some cases, such as on flats) and are such a common feature of our urban areas that it is not justified to reject them out of hand.
We have written a case study about a recent success for a dormer in Walthamstow, where the council applied its usual standards without taking full account of the character of the area and similar extensions that had been built nearby. You can read the full details in our case study here:
Planning appeal success – dormer extension in Waltham Forest
When planning appeals in Waltham Forest tend to succeed
Appeals in Waltham Forest are often successful where refusals turn on a matter of judgement and opinion, rather than clear policy conflict. This is particularly the case where the council accepts the principle of development but objects to scale, design or impact.
Appeals can also be effective where similar development exists nearby but has been given limited weight, or where refusal reasons are expressed in general terms without clearly identifying the harm said to arise. These are the types of decisions that inspectors are well placed to reassess independently.
When an appeal is unlikely to be worthwhile
Not every refusal should be appealed. Where a proposal clearly conflicts with adopted policy, causes obvious harm, or seeks to push development well beyond what the site can reasonably accommodate, an appeal is unlikely to succeed.
Being selective matters. A realistic assessment at the outset is often the difference between a constructive appeal and a costly distraction.
What to do next
If you have received a planning refusal in Waltham Forest, the first step should always be a careful review of the decision notice and the reasons for refusal. Understanding whether those reasons are likely to stand up to independent scrutiny is key.
You can read more about how we handle planning appeals in Waltham Forest, including the types of cases we regularly deal with, here.
