Appeal 3293707

The appeal is dismissed.

At the time of my visit construction activity was evident at the appeal site. The appellant confirmed this was in accordance with plans relating to a lawful development certificate (LDC) issued by the Council for a hip to gable and rear roof extension, which is shown on the existing plans.

The main issue is the effect of the proposal upon the character and appearance of the existing building and the surrounding area.

[site address] mainly comprises small terraces of 4, 2 storey, houses with hipped roofs at either end of the terrace. Many houses along the street have side extensions of 1 or 2 storeys with either a flat or hipped roof. All side extensions that I saw had roofs set down below the main roof ridge and therefore appeared subservient to their host property. Several rear roof dormers were also present within the area, visible from the street in gaps between houses and from the rear of the appeal site and other back gardens.

The appeal property is an end of terrace house with a 2 storey side extension. A hip to gable roof extension has been constructed up to where the main roof meets the existing side extension. The proposal is to extend this over the side extension replacing the lower hipped roof shown on the existing plans and to add a rear dormer along the full width of the extended roof.

The proposed hip to gable extension would continue at the same ridge height as the existing hip to gable extension. Consequently, the side extension roof would no longer step down and appear subservient to the main house. As a result, the roof would appear elongated and more dominant than the roofs of other houses within the street. The lack of a break in its height would also exaggerate the difference between the proposed roof and the hipped roof on the neighbouring dwelling and on the other end of the terrace of which the appeal property is part. It would therefore harm the character and appearance of the existing house and the surrounding area.

The proposed rear dormer would extend across the full width of the extended roof. Whilst it would be set slightly above the eaves level, it would dominate the roof and, as suggested by the Council, would appear as a third floor rather than a subservient roof extension. [name] note that other houses have full width rear dormers, in most cases enough of the original roof is exposed above the eaves that they do fill the whole roof plane. As such they do not appear as dominant and harmful in appearance as the proposed development.

Overall, I consider that both the proposed hip to gable roof extension and the rear dormer would appear as incongruous and dominant additions to the host property harming both its character and appearance and that of the wider area. The proposed development would therefore be contrary to policies CC1, CC2 and SC7 of the London Borough of Hounslow Local Plan (2015-2030) (2015) which seek high quality attractive development that sensitively responds to the area’s character and in the case of extensions are subordinate to the existing building, and the Council’s Residential Extension Guidelines Supplementary Planning Document (2017) which states that full house width dormers will normally be refused and that rear roof extensions should be set at least 0.3 m below ridge level, at least 0.5 m above eaves level and at least 0.5 m from the sides of the roof.

I have had regard to the appellant’s examples of houses with roof extensions, but none were directly comparable to the proposed development. I note that, notwithstanding the photographs submitted with the appeal statement for the rear extension at [address], the extracts of the plans for that development appear to show a smaller rear dormer than is proposed in this appeal. In any case, I have come to my own view regarding the development rather than relying on the approach the Council may have taken elsewhere.