Listing and Gardens

[geoffreyroe]

I have a grade 2 listed old farmhouse, i hope to charge my parking area into garden and my current garden area into a parking area, this reorganisation will better suit the use of the property. I wonder if anyone has knowledge of the scope of a listing, does it extend to the garden areas? and are there any other planning issuies or restrictions to be aware of.

The works would change the appearance of the property (the new parking area would also be nearer to my neigbours), but the buildings themselves would be untouched, there is no mention of gardens or curtilage in the actual listing.

Any experiances would be a help, many thanks.

 

[Penners]

The listing of a building includes everything within its curtilage. So the acceptability of your plans will depend very much on their details. It might be advisable to have a chat with your CO about the changes before you undertake them.

You also need to consider that, if your plans involve changing your access to the public road, this will probably need planning permission.

 

[Gareth Hughes]

Quite apart from listed building considerations, almost any form of hard surfacing (even where it replaces existing hard surfacing) now requires planning permission (in an attempt to reduce the number of impermeable driveways that increase rainwater runoff and potential flooding)

 

[Carol]

We have almost finished making a parking area out of the end of our garden, 50 m from our GII house. We had extensive consultations with planners which took almost eighteen months to resolve and the work was subject to LBC as a nearby wall was also curtilage listed. We had informal discussions with our CO at an early stage and it has been quite stressful!

But the new walls and entrance gates, done by our lime-loving stonemason look beautiful and look better that the semi-derelict wall it replaced. Be prepared to do it the right way for your area (probably at greater cost!!) using the local stone etc. and get to know and talk to your CO and local councillors.

I parked in my new parking space for the first time yesterday, and was hugely relieved that I didn't hit the stone piers with my car, the gate is a little narrower than we would have liked, due to CO and planner compromise!

 

[geoffreyroe]

Thanks for your comments, I take on board all your helpful points.

The grass area that i wish to convert to parking will need know alterations to access it, we can just drive straight onto it now (its completly open), so i guess theres no rules to stop me doing just that and park on the grass. It seems its the works to lay a hard standing that will need permissions.

This at very least will give me a good starting point to request permissions to make the area more permanant?

 

[Merlin]

We have recently converted our front garden to parking, with the plan to return the back yard to garden. We are not in a conservation area, nor in a listed house though.

We needed to have the kerb dropped which did not require planning permission, as the road that we would drive on to was not classified. If it had been a classified road we would have had to have obtained planning permission to drop the kerb. The Council were able to tell us that the road was not classified.

The kerb drop had to be completed by an accredited streetworks contractor, with the correct insurances in place, and the Council also sent us specifications that the work had to comply with. We had to pay an inspection fee to the Council, for them to come out and inspect the work after it had been completed.

The parking area itself is permeable with a slate finish on top. If we had wanted tarmac or concrete, or a non-permeable surface, we would have required planning permission. We were told that blockwork, slate or gravel did not require planning permission, as they were permeable.

I appreciate this is not quite the same situation as yourself.