Appeal 6000805

The appeal is allowed and the planning permission Ref 24/01483/FUL for erection of four-bay self-service automobile jet washing units and two vacuum bays with associated works at [site address] , granted on 3 April 2025 by Southampton City Council, is varied by deleting condition 4 and substituting for it the following condition: 4 – The uses hereby permitted shall only take place between the following hours: 0700 – 1900 Mondays to Sundays.

Since the submission of this appeal, the approved development has commenced operating. The appellant has commissioned a second independent Noise Impact Assessment Review (the NIAR)1 which takes account of the operation of the facility and assesses the validity of the Noise Assessment Report (the NAR) which was submitted with the planning application2.

The appellant submitted the NIAR to provide an updated assessment which could not have been undertaken at the time of the determination of the planning application prior to the development commencing. However, the NIAR has been submitted at the [name] stage of this appeal, so that the Council and other interested parties notified of the appeal did not have the opportunity to comment on this report as part of the normal appeal process. 1 [name] 43045-R2 dated 7 November 2025 2 24 Acoustics Noise Assessment Ref R10717-1 Rev 1 dated 28 October 2024

I have invited further comments from the Council in respect of the NIAR, but the Council has declined to comment citing insufficient time to consider this matter. Moreover, interested neighbours who have been notified of the appeal have had no opportunity to comment.

Accordingly, given the specific circumstances of this Section 79 appeal, whereby the condition which the appellant directly seeks to modify was imposed in the interests of protecting nearby residential properties from noise effects associated with the approved development, I cannot be satisfied that accepting this late evidence would not cause prejudice or injustice to any interested party. I have taken account of Court judgement on this matter3 and, accordingly, I have determined the appeal based on the NAR that was before the Council at the time of the determination of the application and upon which its decision was based.

The appeal site is occupied by a self-service vehicle jet wash business which includes 4 enclosed jet wash bays and 2 open vacuum bays. It lies in the south-east corner of the car park serving the Antelope Park retail and leisure complex, which includes shops, a supermarket, restaurants, a 24/7 gym and a childrens’ soft play facility.

Prior to the implementation of the development, the appeal site was given over to parking spaces comprising part of the wider retail park car park. The car washing facilities are accessed via the car park which in turn is accessed from [site address] via [address].

To the east and southeast of the appeal site, and separated from it by a belt of trees and soft landscaping, there are blocks of 5-storey high residential flats in [address]. The closest of these lies within approximately 25m of the site. Two other blocks are also within approximately 60m of the site, and the remaining 3 are sited more than 80m away.

The condition in dispute restricts the hours of operation of the jet washing units and vacuum bays to between 0800 and 1800 hours on any day of the week in the interests of protecting the living conditions of nearby residential occupiers having regard to the noise associated with the approved use.

The appellant seeks to amend this condition to allow operating hours of between 0700 and 1900 hours Monday to Sunday. As such, the main issue is the effect that these proposed opening times would have on the living conditions of neighbouring residents in [address], having particular regard to noise disturbance.

The impact of the car wash facility on the neighbouring living conditions needs to be assessed within the context of the appeal site within a busy car park serving a range of commercial uses associated with the retail park as a whole. These include restaurants and takeaways and a gym which have opening hours which exceed those sought by the appellant. Moreover, the site is close to the heavily trafficked [site address] and the main access road into and out of the car park which is subject to a traffic lighted junction with [site address] and a roundabout at the car park entrance. As such, the neighbouring residential properties would 3 Ashley, R (on the application of) v SSCLG & Ors [2012] [name] 559 already be subject to ambient noise levels associated with the commercial uses of the retail park and traffic using the nearby roads and retail park carpark.

The NAR submitted with the planning application assessed the impact of the appeal scheme on the nearest residential properties, having regard to the existing background sound levels, noise measurement data from an existing car wash facility by the same manufacturer as that of the appeal scheme and a service station vacuum unit, and measurements taken over a time period which included the hours of operation that are currently sought.

The NAR also took account of the noise mitigation measures incorporated into the design of the facility, notably the enclosing of the car wash bays on 3 sides and the provision of a 3m high acoustic barrier positioned along part of the southeastern edge of the car park.

The NAR was undertaken in accordance with BS4142 guidance4 and concluded that, subject to the inclusion of the aforesaid mitigation measures and a restriction of operating hours to between 0700 to 1900 hours each day, the overall noise levels produced from the site would be reduced to below the existing level of daytime background noise in the area in the case of 3 of the neighbouring blocks of flats and would be increased by only 1db in the case of the fourth. These results indicate that the noise impact would be ‘low’ and ‘less than adverse’, having regard to the BS4142 standard methodology.

The more restricted operating hours contained within condition 4 of between 0800 and 1800 hours Monday to Sunday resulted from a motion to amend the officer recommendation following discussion of the item by the Council’s Planning and Rights of [name] at the meeting on 1 April 2025.

The Council’s appeal statement confirms that, in reducing the operating hours from those originally applied for, the Council took into account concerns raised by residents of flats in [address] about noise levels in the earlier part of the morning and in the evening, when parents are trying to settle young children, and when disturbance to young children’s sleep would result in harmful stress effects on nearby residents adversely affecting their quality of life.

I have no reason to doubt the Council’s view that background noise levels increase over time between 7am and 8am and decrease between 6pm and 7pm and that these hours can be more sensitive to noise impacts than those in between. Notwithstanding this, it is the hours of 7am to 11pm that are defined as day-time hours in accordance with the Noise Act 1996.

I have noted the Council’s concerns about the intermittent nature of the noise generated by the appeal scheme whereby residents would not know exactly when the noise from the car wash facility would occur. I have also noted the Council’s concerns about future ‘creeping’ increases in background noise over time.

However, notwithstanding the above, the appellant’s NAR has been carried out by an acoustic consultancy in accordance with established BS4142 guidance. It has taken account of the proposed operating hours, the specific nature of the appeal scheme and the characteristics of the appeal site and its surroundings. Also, the 4 [name]. [name] 4142: Methods for rating and assessing commercial and industrial sound, 2014 (Revised 2019) survey work was undertaken during the summer, when neighbouring residential impacts could reasonably be expected to be higher due to open windows.

The Council has not disputed the methodology used and the results reached, and significantly, it has not provided any substantive alternative survey evidence to contradict the appellant’s NAR.

For the above reasons, I therefore conclude that there is no cogent evidence before me that the proposed increased operating times of between 0700 and 1900 hours Monday to Sunday would materially harm the living conditions of neighbouring residents in [address], having particular regard to noise disturbance. This is subject to the retention of condition 7 which requires the implementation and subsequent maintenance and retention of the noise mitigation measures contained within the appellant’s NAR.

As such, amending condition 4 accordingly would accord with saved Policies SDP1 and SDP16 of the City of Southampton Local Plan Review (March 2015), in so much as these policies, amongst other things, seek to ensure that new development does not unacceptably affect the amenity of the city and its citizens and that noise-generating development does not cause an unacceptable level of noise impact.

This accords with Paragraph 135 of the National Planning Policy Framework 2024 as it seeks to create places which promote health and wellbeing with a high standard of amenity for existing and future users of developments.

For the reasons set out above, I conclude that the appeal should be allowed, and condition 4 be amended as proposed by the appellant.