The Town and Country Planning General (Permitted Development) Order (GPDO) 2015

The 2015 Order came into force on 15th April 2015.The 2015 GPDO consolidates all the changes over the last 20 years since the 1995 version of the Order. It also adds some new additional items.

This is a brief summary of the recent changes, which includes some additions to permitted changes of use (CoU):

  • Betting office or payday loan now ‘sui generis’ not A2 (financial)
  • Retail (A1) or Financial and professional services (A2) or betting office or pay day loan shop (‘sui generis’) to restaurants/cafes(A3)
  • Retail (A1) or betting office to finance and professional services (A2)
  • Retail (A1) to Assembly & leisure (D2)
  • Casinos or amusement arcades to dwelling houses (C3)
  • B8(warehouse or storage) to dwelling houses
  • A new permission for temporary use of building and land for commercial film making
  • Permission for some development ancillary to a retail use, e.g the provision of “click and collect” facilities within the curtilage of a shop and the extension of a loading bay
  • A new permission for the extension of buildings used for waste facilities
  • A new permission for solar PV on the roof of non-domestic premises with a limit of 1 megawatt of generating capacity
  • The date for expiry of the time-limited permission to make larger home extensions is extended from 2016 to 2019
  •  The previously time-limited permitted development rights for extensions to non-domestic properties have been made permanent
  •  Article 1(5) land ( AONB, conservation areas etc) is now Article 2(3)
  •  Article 1(6) land (National Parks) is now Article 2(4)
  • Greater use of the prior approval procedure than before with stated limitations, exclusions and conditions subject to which the new rights are granted – many especially apply to CoU from a range of uses to C3 (residential)

The consolidation is welcomed as the multitude of changes in various amendment documents over the last two decades was getting unwieldy. The 2015 Order endeavours to move with the times to take account of current methods of retailing, and to create more homes in areas through change of use, though most of these changes do require prior approval notification procedures and are size limited.

For more details and advice on this or other town planning matters please contact:

Jane Dickman at Dickman
Associates Ltd on 07946845438 or by email at
jd@dickmanassociates.co.uk

CHARTERED TOWN PLANNER

Director: J Dickman BSc (Hons) DipTP MRTPI FRGS FRICS

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