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news
Leicester shed via FacebookShedgate: Planning officers “got it wrong” says Leicester mayor
The Mayor of Leicester says the city council’s planning officers “have got it wrong” in telling a family they are unlikely to receive planning permission for a bike shed they have erected in their front garden, and has urged for the issue to be referred to the planning committee.
As we reported on our live blog last week, Kavi Pujara's family have been told that they could face enforcement action to remove the bike shed because they live in a conservation area.
The family have received numerous messages of support since the story broke, including on the council’s planning portal, and a decision on the “'retrospective application for construction of bike shed at front of house” should be made by 20 May – a week tomorrow.
In a statement posted to Twitter yesterday, Sir Peter Soulsby, the former Labour MP for Leicester South who resigned in April 2011 to run for the newly created position of elected mayor of the East Midlands city, outlined why he believed planning officers had been too strict in interpreting the rules.
Much better to build a bike shed than tarmacking garden to make a car park! This needs to go to Planning Committee for members to take an independent view. https://t.co/W3ZvQwVW4f pic.twitter.com/dqCFx3BibW
— Leicester City Mayor (@CityMayorLeic) May 11, 2021
“As mayor, I do not and will not decide planning applications but on this one I believe that the officers have got it wrong.
“The shed is well screened from the road and much less of a problem than if the residents tarmacked the garden and parked a car on it.
“Providing a space to store bikes is going to be increasingly important,” he continued.
“I know the planning officers were doing their job to protect the conservation area and very much support that work, but this time they’ve got the balance wrong.
“As the elected representative of the residents, I will be asking for this decision to be taken to the planning committee where councillors can have an opportunity to reach their own independent conclusion,” he added.
According to figures obtained by Cycling UK following a Freedom of Information request to councils across England, Leicester was the fifth-highest spending local authority last year in terms of spending per head on active travel, at £20.97.
The council has won plaudits for pop-up infrastructure it put in place in response to the coronavirus pandemic, making the planning department’s stance over the bike shed difficult to comprehend.
Mr Pujara had first highlighted the problem on Facebook, where he wrote: “We are a family of four cyclists who last September made an eco bike shed in our front garden.
“It is made of sustainably grown wood and has a sedum living roof. Other houses in the same terrace have converted their front gardens to driveways for parking multiple cars – so there really isn't a homogeneous Victorian look to the street anyway.”
In a subsequent post, he asked the council: “How about some joined-up thinking here? If the city is serious about promoting cycling should you not get serious about storage solutions for cycles too?
“I understand that sheds in front gardens aren't a permitted development, but we do need to store bikes somewhere. Perhaps with some planning guidance on building a bike shed from the council we could do this in a harmonious way and really be a cycle-friendly city.”
The family’s cause is being supported by Labour councillor Lindsay Broadwell, who said last week: “Today in Leicester putting a bike shed in your garden is apparently a planning breach, according to the council.
“We simultaneously want to encourage cycling but want to make it hard for people to store their bikes safely? But cars on-street is fine?
Simon joined road.cc as news editor in 2009 and is now the site’s community editor, acting as a link between the team producing the content and our readers. A law and languages graduate, published translator and former retail analyst, he has reported on issues as diverse as cycling-related court cases, anti-doping investigations, the latest developments in the bike industry and the sport’s biggest races. Now back in London full-time after 15 years living in Oxford and Cambridge, he loves cycling along the Thames but misses having his former riding buddy, Elodie the miniature schnauzer, in the basket in front of him.
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Surely the Mayor has got his tone just right - he recognises that he doesn't have juristiction over individual applications/infringments, but that the overall policy (sheds for bikes) needs to have a positive change/precedent.
It could be a planning breach and also acceptable once determined via an application. A breach indicates the works were done without permission that was required. It is usual, unless the breach is particularly egregious, to invite an application to potentially regularise a breach. That application is then determined on its merits. Whether the breach exists after that depends on whether the application is approved or not.
Whether or not the store is acceptable isn't my point here (I have a personal view that it is, on the face of it, but that's not relevant to this) but the councillor quoted appears to be conflating two things and creating a false impression as a result.
Declaration: local authority planning officer (nowhere near Leicester).
Agreed. What one officer (enforcement, probably) may have said informally has little bearing on a different officer making the actual delegated decision, which has not happened yet.
It looks like Peter Soulsby is jumping the gun a bit here and, while I agree with his sentiments, making it political where it does not need to be.
TBH, delegated planning decisions (made by qualified planning officers) are usually a lot more independent and better-informed than planning committees comprising elected members who sometimes come up with some 'ineteresting' responses for reasons to depart from planning policy in their decisions.
In this case, there is little reason to refuse the application. The conservation status does not negate the need for things like bin storage and, since car parking is allowed, it seems perfectly reasonable to allow cycle storage that has been designed sympathetically to its surroundings. It is quite in order to allow the officer to make a reaosnable decision and for the applicant to appeal it if necessary. However, if I was the officer in question, with the political interest, I might be inclined to refer it to committee now: a decision to allow it might look like I had been coerced under public pressure, rather than making a sound decision.
Similar declaration.
So going to the press about things like this works! Who knew...?
Yep and there was me thinking executive functions in councils were meant to stay out of planning policy decisions, so I imagine the planning office heartily welcomed the Mayors input on this.
This is a planning control decision, not a planning policy decision. So yes, the mayor should keep out of it unless it goes to committee and he's on it.
He should keep out of an enforcement decisions at all times, just as he should keep out of individual policing decisions. The enforcement officer has not got it wrong: permitted development does not exist and the development has occurred without permission. It remains a matter of the enforcement officer's judgement whether enforcement action is appropriate but, given it is a conservation area, it would have been odd not to take some form of action.
...all of which brings us back to - the planning policy at work here is an ass.
Declaration: went out with a planner 30 years ago.
The actual local planning policy allows for the shed to be given permission, imho, but it does need that permission.
Planning policy that puts controls on things is not a bad thing - you just need permission for some things, including development at the front of a house or in a conservation area. Otherwise you'd have all manner of ugly enclosures put up as "bike sheds".
It's also fair to say that Leicester's policy is somewhat dated and superseded by national policy. That doesn't make it an ass; it means that government should stop faffing around with unnecessary planning changes and fund local authorities to fund planning properly. Although this case does not prove that point.
Declaration: David... is that you?!!
(Disclaimer: I never went out with David.)
I agree. (My son is a Chartered Planner). Planning role was supposed to be an enabler, but during the past ~30 years it has become a gatekeeper; in the worst possible way.
We now have Tescopoly running amok, sh1te cycle infra built, but can't have secure cycle storage on our land. We can use public highway space to store any number of vehicles though.
This means parking a scrap Luton van with working tail lift on private front land is allowed but not a bicycle shed.
Welcome to #brokenbritain
yes, sorry planning control decision, but basically the mayor has no business getting involved in the specifics of this, and should definitely have kept out of it IMO, even if directly queried by the local press on it the correct response by a career politician should have been "I cant comment on the specifics of this" and then go on to talk about the generalities of maybe its an area they can look at for the future.