Appeal 6004199

The appeal is dismissed.

An application for costs was made by [name] against Medway Council. That application is the subject of a separate decision.

The extant planning permission relates to the erection of two houses. This appeal relates to the rear chalet bungalow. The approved plans show a number of rooflights on the flank elevations and the appeal proposal seeks to vary the drawings to alter these. I saw at my site visit that the dwelling has already been erected and the rooflights that have been installed reflect those on the amended plans, not those on the approved plans.

The main issue is whether the condition is reasonable and necessary in the interests of providing acceptable living conditions for the future occupiers of the development in terms of their outlook.

The approved plans indicate that at the back of the house, at first floor level, there would be a home office/study. This would be served by an obscurely glazed window on the rear facing elevation and a rooflight on its north elevation. The approved plans also show that bedroom 6 at first floor level would be served by two rooflights on the north elevation.

The plans for which approval is now sought show the home office/study as a ‘snug’ and bedroom 6 as a living area. At my site visit I saw that all of these rooms were decorated and ready for use for those purposes.

However the snug is now only served by the obscurely glazed window, with the rooflight now being incorporated into an en-suite bathroom. Though the nature of the use of a snug is not clear, it would, in my view, be used as a habitable room and so should be afforded a reasonable degree of outlook. In the absence of any clear glazed window, this room would fail to provide its users with that.

The rooflights in the living area have a cill level of around 1.7m above internal floor level. However they are of a reasonable size, they afford a good amount of light into the room and a reasonable degree of outlook, providing views of other roofs and trees nearby.

Nonetheless, the lack of a satisfactory outlook from the snug means the amended scheme fails to provide its future occupiers with acceptable living conditions. It is therefore contrary to policy BNE2 of the Medway Local Plan (2003) which seeks to ensure that development secures the amenity of its future occupants. Condition 2 on the extant planning permission is therefore necessary and reasonable as the plans identified in that condition would provide acceptable living conditions for occupiers of the dwelling.

The appellant refers to a number of other appeals. [name] do not have full details of these it appears none of them relate to development with rooms with no clear glazed windows, as is the case in this current appeal. Likewise, though there are similar rooflights in the dwelling at the front of the site, I saw no rooms that were not served by any clear glazed windows. Consequently, these other examples are not comparable to the appeal development.

The development as shown in the proposed plans fails to accord with the development plan as a whole and there are no other considerations that indicate a decision other than in accordance with the development plan. Therefore, for the reasons set out above, the appeal is dismissed.