Do they check planning permission?

[loply]

Hi folks,

I'm in the middle of negotiating with my local council over a fence/wall on the side of a corner property.

I want to build it 2m high for privacy, but they want me to make it no more than 1.3m high.

It's currently a 0.5m concrete prefab fence with about 2m of overgrown hedge.

I sent the council 8 photos of properties (mostly corner ones) within 200m which have 2m fences to which they replied they had all been done without permission.

Cue the obvious thought, since they are all of various ages but clearly not new, I should just follow suit and ignore the council and do what I want.

Question is, since I've already applied for PP, will they come round and check? There's other stuff in the same application (extension etc).

Cheers for any advice,
Rich

 

[nickjb]

They rarely come and check. We were selected for random auditing. A work experience lad came round before we started and measured the site, said he'd be back once we started but we never saw him again. Only issue is you happen to have a passing jobsworth or troublesome neighbours.

 

[fishcake]

I have had the council turn up at my house twice. Both times i was building workshops (at different houses) which needed no planning or building regs and both times they went away happy. I can only presume that neighbours had complained in both instances.

They get enquiries all the time and if they checked every house that enquired about something, they would need an army of staff.

Whether you think it is worth the risk going ahead is up to you.

 

[loply]

In that case I think I'll just build it the height that I want regardless.

Worst case scenario all I have to do is set up the laser level and run a jigsaw along the fence panels to reduce the height...

At least I can grow some 80ft Lleylandi in the meantime

 

[tony1851]

Many corner plots have 2m walls/fences, and councils don't seem to bother.

But bear in mind that, although there might be eight properties near you with similar fences, that amounts to nothing.

As planning officers like to say, "there's no such thing as precedent in planning terms".

I had a client two years ago who put up such a fence, when there were others equally high locally. Someone complained / council came round - told him to submit a planning application / that was refused / Appealed - that was dismissed. Result? had to cut it down, council agreed to 1.2m.

 

[cjard]

Yeah, we had a guy on here a while ago with a similar thing, didn't we? It was some kind of plastic picket fence in front of his house and he'd gone to war with the council over its height and the distance to the the road or something...