New detached dwelling granted in Wiltshire village

RCC were approached by a local farmer following recommendations and previous successful applications in the village by RCC.  Their wish was to be able to build a new dwelling for their daughter and family on an underused area of roadside land.  We knew the council would consider the site to be outside the built area of the village and therefore contrary to planning policy, the site was also in the village conservation area and had a number of listed building around it.  Finally the site was in a bat consultation zone which meant more hurdles to jump through.

We are however always up for a challenge and in this instance we knew we could use the council's lack of a 5 year housing land supply, and the fact that this would be a self-build house, as significant material planning considerations.  We still however required the siting, scale and design of the dwelling to be carefully considered and we also need to carefully address the ecology issues with the specific bat requirements for this location.  

RCC assembled a great team of other consultants around us which resulted in a really attractive and appropriate dwelling design being submitted plus a robust ecology case to deal with the bat issues. 

We had an objection from the conservation officer but RCC brought together a rebuttal response to ensure the planning officer had the case set out as to why other material considerations justified approving the application.  The result was approval under delegated powers.