Appeal 3321974

The appeal is dismissed.

The main issues are the effect of the proposed development upon: • Vehicular and pedestrian safety; and, • the character and appearance of the surrounding area.

The appeal site relates to an end house in a terrace of four. The house is set behind a front garden laid to lawn with a low wooden picket fence along the front boundary at the pavement edge. The road is narrow in this section of the street and nearby signs indicate that parking, partly on the pavement, is allowed within marked parking areas. There is a parking space marked out in front of the font gate at the appeal property. Double yellow lines prevent parking outside the remainder of the appeal site and the rest of the terrace up to the nearby road junction. There is a mature cherry tree planted on the pavement in front of the house. The neighbouring houses either side of the appeal property have crossovers and off road parking. Elsewhere along the road there is a mix of off road and kerbside parking.

Policy EC2 of the London Borough of Hounslow Local Plan 2015-2030 (2015) (LP) requires proposals for vehicle crossovers to be consistent with the council’s adopted [name] and Off-Street Parking Policy (2016) (RCOSPP). The RCOSPP seeks to protect front gardens but notes that their retention should be balanced against the rights of householders to have parking access for their property, subject to parking provision meeting certain size and safety standards.

The proposed parking space and hardstanding would lead to the loss of the appellant’s front garden and falls short of the minimum parking space width and length requirements set out in the RCOSPP. These dimensions are intended to prevent parked vehicles encroaching onto the footway and obstructing pedestrians or forcing them to use the road. The crossover would be located to the side of the tree which sits behind the on street parking space in front of the house. The tree, in combination with any vehicle parked in the existing space, would obstruct views between traffic approaching the crossover and vehicles leaving the appeal site. I note that traffic will have slowed at the nearby bend in the road, but the poor visibility on this narrow section of road would present a danger to both pedestrians and vehicles. The proposed development would therefore conflict with Policy EC2 and the RCOSPP which seek to avoid harm to highway safety.

Houses in the area are set back from the pavement with a mix of retained gardens and off street parking. However, in the terrace of which the appeal site is part, front gardens with soft landscaping are not a defining feature. Neighbouring properties have paved forecourts for off street parking and other houses are paved with some planted edges. Although the proposed development contains no landscaping, the appellant has indicated a willingness to incorporate planting into the scheme and accept a planning condition to that effect. In my view, such a condition would overcome objections on the grounds of the proposed development’s impact on the appearance of the area and thus there would be no conflict with Policies CC1, CC2 and SC7 of the LP and the RCOSPP which require development to maintain the character of the area.

For the reasons given above I conclude that the appeal should be dismissed.