With confirmation that 2012 was the second wettest year on record in the UK and the Environment Agency revealing that in England and Wales 2.5 million properties are at risk of coastal and river flooding, the risk of exposure to flooding has increased dramatically.

The need for investment in flooding defences is surely greater than ever. Figures compiled by the Greater London Authority and released by the Guardian, show that 850,000 properties lie in areas of London where there is significant risk of surface water, river and tidal flooding.

This accounts for one in four of every property in London. Yet, while the collective value of these properties is around £250 billion, there has been a 50% reduction in flood defence investment in London between 2009-10 and 2012-13, from £34 million to £17 million.

The susceptibility of land to flooding is also an important factor when considering land purchase or undertaking new developments, whether large or small. A Flood Risk Assessment (FRA) is becoming ever more crucial to a planning application, as the risks to occupiers and owners grow increasingly serious. FRAs investigate the probability of flooding in an area, and present recommendations for mitigating measures to reduce the impact of flooding to the site and surrounding area.

William Chambers of Planning and Environmental Consultancy, EnviroSolution, commented that after the recent flooding in Europe, where damage is estimated at €12bn but where insurance only is in place for €3bn, and with the imminent expiry of the one month extension agreement between the UK Government and Insurance Industry, to provide cover for High Flood Risk properties, it is essential for developers to consider an FRA prior to buying a site or developing a scheme, as it could leave tracts of land blighted and properties unsalable.

Property Aspects appreciates the contribution to this article from Will Chambers of EnviroSolution. EnviroSolution is able to provide detailed Flood Risk Assessments for residential or commercial developments of any scale, nationwide.

For more information on a flood risk assessment, please contact Will Chambers directly at EnviroSolution on 0151 291 6451 or email will@envirosolution.co.uk

How advances in technology are simplifying the measurement of environmental noise.

All day, every day, we are immersed in noise – environmental noise. It’s all around us and yet so many us take it for granted and never try to understand the multitude of sounds that surround us. But then measurement of noise is a technically complex and hugely expensive undertaking, isn’t it?

At least that’s how many of us view acoustics, the study of sound – specialist knowledge that can only be wielded by those indoctrinated into the black art of acoustics. But advances in technology are changing the acoustic landscape drastically.

Any of us can now download a simple app onto our smart phone that will measure the noise around us, even enabling the capture of audio-samples and allowing all of us to contribute to global research projects such as Salford University’s worldwide soundscape research project, www.soundaroundyou.com.

Mike Potts of Echo Acoustics, a consultancy company that undertakes professional assessment of environmental noise, is a keen advocate of technology in his area of work. “The widely accepted way of measuring noise, particularly over long time periods, can be a time consuming and complicated task utilising highly expensive and complex equipment followed by careful detailed technical analysis. Whilst there is still a need for this level of accuracy in detailed planning, design or legal cases, it needn’t always be so; technology based on the microphones in every mobile phone now allow anybody to measure noise to a reasonable degree of accuracy”.

Mike goes on to point out that “On the professional front, this same technology can also enable local authority’s to measure noise at a strategic level within their areas, over time periods of months or even years, at a tiny fraction of the cost of traditional measurement methods.

And it doesn’t stop there; industrial operators close to residential areas can now continuously monitor noise at their boundaries for relatively little capital outlay and construction contractors can monitor noise at nearby houses in the same way, enabling them to better understand and control their noise emissions”.

As communities grow and spread, the noise we create and are exposed to increases all the time. Recent research has indicated strong correlations between long term exposure to moderate levels of community noise and secondary health effects such as heart disease. As a direct result of this, the Environment Directorate of the European Parliament are currently part way through a process of environmental noise mapping across Member States in an effort to better understand and control community noise exposure. Advances in noise measurement techniques have the potential to increase the coverage and detail of data gathering whilst reducing timescales and costs significantly, hopefully leading to a calmer, quieter environment for all of us.

Property Aspects appreciates the contribution to this article from Mike Potts of Echo Acoustics. Echo Acoustics offers advice on the most appropriate course of action for any environmental noise or vibration related problem.

For more information on a noise assessment in the workplace, please contact Mike Potts directly at Echo Acoustics on 07913 392792 or email mike@echo-acoustics.co.uk

Occupational noise is a work hazard perhaps more readily identifiable with working in heavy industry. Ship building, large construction sites and heavy manufacture all conjure images of bustling environments where high levels of noise are constant.

Some 170,000 people in the UK alone suffer from a variety of ear conditions such as tinnitus and partial deafness due to excessive noise exposure in the work place.

The significance of the potential for noise induced hearing loss is widely under-estimated by employers and employees alike. The Noise at Work Regulations of 2005 require that employers undertake risk assessment of employee noise exposure and, where noise exposure is judged to be significant, specific measures must be taken to reduce noise.

Failure to adhere to the legislation can expose firms to potential fines for putting employees at risk as well as the potential for litigation from those suffering hearing loss.

According to Mike Potts of Echo Acoustics, a firm that specialises in helping companies in assessing workplace noise, undertaking an initial risk assessment of employee noise exposure is a relatively simple task requiring no specialist skills or equipment.

‘Most employers can quickly and easily undertake a simple risk assessment of noise exposure themselves and yet they don’t realise just how important it can be to do so; there are now legal firms in the UK specialising in pursuing legal claims for occupational hearing damage.

Employers also generally don’t realise that the Noise at Work Regulations require that, where practicable, noise exposure must be reduced irrespective of the level of the noise and that this must be achieved through organisational and operational changes wherever possible. The use of personal hearing protection is a ‘last line of defence’ and should only be used where noise cannot be reduced through other means or as an interim measure whilst other changes are made.

Companies like Echo Acoustics can help employers to better understand their legal requirements under the Noise at Work Regulations 2005 and to start working to reduce their employees’ noise exposure.

Property Aspects appreciates the contribution to this article from Mike Potts of Echo Acoustics. Echo Acoustics offers advice on the most appropriate course of action for any environmental noise or vibration related problem.

For more information on a noise assessment in the workplace, please contact Mike Potts directly at Echo Acoustics on 07913 392792 or email mike@echo-acoustics.co.uk

The recession has hit us hard and with job satisfaction hitting a low, many entrepreneurs are taking the leap and starting their own business.

According to a report by Duport.co.uk a lot of businesses have started right here in the North West, particularly in Salford. According to the report, company formation in Salford hit a record high last year, with 787 new companies being formed – more than any other year in the history of the area and a 5% rise on the previous year.

One North West based entrepreneur, Amanda Olley, is celebrating her first year of business after she took the decision to start her own Town Planning consultancy, Summit Planning Associates.

She spoke with Property Aspects about it: “The idea of eventually setting up my own practice had always been in the back of my mind and then at the beginning of 2011 a number of professional and personal factors came together to make it the right time to make the jump. It’s been the best thing I could have done. I’m still doing what I love and the business is going from strength to strength.”

In another report, research by the Royal Bank of Scotland reports that it is women starting their own businesses who have increased job satisfaction and a better work-life balance.

“Since setting up Summit Planning Associates, I have come across so many people who have also started their own businesses in the last 3-4 years. To say that we are still in a struggling economy, it seems that this is the climate that breeds entrepreneurialism. Threats of redundancy and decreasing job satisfaction in a shrinking jobs market seems to light the entrepreneur fuse in those people who want to have more control over their own destiny and not leave their future to chance.”

“Setting up my own practice has added many new working relationships to those that were already well-established. One of the core principles of the practice, is a collaborative approach to the assembly of project-specific teams which allows us to maintain a competitive advantage and provide maximum value to our clients, without compromising the quality of service provided.”

Amanda Olley has been a Chartered Town Planner for 12 years and is an expert in her field. For more information, contact Summit Planning Associates via Tel: 01625 801800 or E-Mail: amandaolley@summitassociates.co.uk

After public consultation, Trafford Council has approved an application for Trafford Park to be designated as Greater Manchester’s first Business Neighbourhood Area.

The area is identified as a Business Neighbourhood Plan frontrunner under the provisions of the governments Neighbourhood Planning proposals that were introduced through the Localism Act.

Planning consultant and Director of Summit Planning Associates, Amanda Olley, has spoken to Property Aspects before about Localism, Neighbourhood Plans and the key issues surrounding the plan-led system.

She told us: “This is great news for the business community within Trafford Park. It should help ensure the area’s continued future growth and attract further investment into the area. The Management Board for the Business Neighbourhood Area includes representatives from major players who have a long standing reputation and commitment to the prosperity of Trafford and Manchester as a whole and its standing at a regional, national and international level.”

“To date, most of the press relating to the implementation of Neighbourhood Planning proposals has centred on local residential communities wanting to have a hand in shaping development proposals in their areas. This has led to wide speculation that it will result in increased instances of NIMBYism that will further stifle development and economic growth.”

“The designation of Business Neighbourhood Areas, with the principle aim of enhancing the growth of existing business communities and attracting further investment should hopefully foster greater confidence in this process. I will be watching the development of the Trafford Park Business Neighbourhood Plan with keen interest.”

Property Aspects Magazine appreciates the contribution to this article from Amanda Olley at Summit Planning Associates.

For further information, contact Summit Planning Associates via Tel: 01625 801800, E-Mail: amandaolley@summitassociates.co.uk or Website: www.summitassociates.co.uk

Ministers and Peers have been presented with a compromise proposal from the government, following the recent backlash against its plans to allow home owners to build large extensions without needing to apply for planning permission.

The proposed rules, amending permitted development rights, had been designed to remove the barriers currently in place to homeowners, and to help those who are having difficulty selling or getting additional finance to move.

A recent vote in the Commons on a proposed amendment forwarded by the House of Lords, to allow Council’s to opt out of this change to permitted development rights, was narrowly won by the government, despite a number of Tory backbenchers also speaking out against the government’s plans.

Communities secretary, Eric Pickles, had told the Commons that this issue was “eminently bridgeable” and that he would like the opportunity to make that bridge. The compromise proposal is the attempt at making that bridge and proposes a ‘light touch’ 21-day neighbour consultation process to be followed before extension proposals could be implemented.

Property Aspects magazine spoke with planning consultant and Director of Summit Planning Associates, Amanda Olley. She explained: “In general terms I suspect many homeowners will be pleased about the new plans as, to date, the unpredictability of the planning system has probably stopped a lot of people from considering the ‘extension’ avenue.”

She continued, “Concerns levied against the government’s plans have included, an expected increase in unsightly and unsuitable extensions and in the number of disputes between neighbours. The compromise proposal presented by the government is akin to the ‘prior approval’ process that is not unfamiliar in other areas of planning. In these circumstances, the best case scenario is a delay of 21 days, if no objections are raised and the worst case scenario, is the home owner still ends up drawn into an unpredictable and costly process that ultimately gets them no further forward.”

Property Aspects Magazine appreciates the contribution to this article from Amanda Olley at Summit Planning Associates.

For further information, contact Summit Planning Associates via Tel: 01625 801800, E-Mail: amandaolley@summitassociates.co.uk or Website: www.summitassociates.co.uk

There is no doubt that, for developers, there should be many benefits to engaging with the area planning authority before submitting a planning application.

But in practice, how easy is this to do and are planning authorities embracing the opportunities that pre-application liaison and discussions can bring?

Amanda Olley, planning consultant and Director of Summit Planning Associates spoke to Property Aspects magazine. She said: “In many cases engagement between the developer and the planning authority works particularly well, making more effective use of Council time and keeping overall costs to the developer at a reasonable level. It is always better to try and engage with the local planning authority before applications are submitted, so that detailed proposals can be developed having had the input of the Council or even just so that they are made aware that an application is coming, if it is for smaller, relatively straightforward proposals.”

“Unfortunately, recent experience has seen a lack of willingness on the part of Local Planning Authorities to engage in pre-application discussions regarding larger scale proposals, on the basis that the application caseload of the planner must take priority and no time can be afforded to pre-application work.”

She continued, “One explanation for this is the increased caseloads of individual planners following recent staff cutbacks and redundancies. I’m afraid that is a two way street though. The private sector suffered its greatest staff losses in the early phases of the current economic downturn and still had to find the manpower to engage with the public sector when bringing proposals forward. At a time when there are now small signs of economic improvement, Local Planning Authorities need to take responsibility for the contribution that they can make to encouraging this further and realise the increased confidence that their pre-application engagement can bring to development proposals.”

Property Aspects Magazine appreciates the contribution to this article from Amanda Olley at Summit Planning Associates.

For further information, contact Summit Planning Associates via Tel: 01625 801800 or E-Mail: amandaolley@summitassociates.co.uk

It has now been 12 months since the publication of the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF).

The policies and guidance of the Framework applied immediately from the day of its publication (27th March 2012) and transitional implementation arrangements allowed Local Planning Authorities to continue to give full weight to the policies of development plans that had been adopted after 2004.

This was for an initial period of 12 months, even if there was a limited degree of conflict with the NPPF.

Following the expiry of this initial 12 month period, Local Planning Authorities must now only afford due weight to adopted policies according to their consistency with the policies and guidance of the NPPF. Emerging policy can also be afforded weight on the same basis and in consideration of the extent of consultation conducted; and objections or support expressed.

As the initial 12 month transitional period approached expiry, Planning Magazine reported that around half of all English planning authorities would remain ‘plan-less’. This led to calls from the National Trust and CPRE for the extension of this period to give Local Planning Authorities more time to prepare and adopt updated development plan policy.

Planning consultant and Director of Summit Planning Associates, Amanda Olley, spoke to Property Aspects on this matter. “Plan-making has always been a painfully slow and cumbersome process and a significant proportion of local authorities were always going to struggle to update and adopt new development plan policy within the initial 12 months of the NPPF being published. That said, it is highly unlikely that extending the transitional period in the short term would make a lot of difference.”

She continued; “The NPPF is the baseline position for local authorities when preparing new development plan policy. Therefore not extending the transitional period is a better way of keeping the pressure on plan-making teams across the country, to prepare and adopt up-to-date policy that accords with the principles of the NPPF in the best way to address the development needs of their local area.”

Amanda Olley has been a Chartered Town Planner for 12 years and is an expert in her field. For more information, contact Summit Planning Associates via Tel: 01625 801800 or E-Mail: amandaolley@summitassociates.co.uk

The government has removed the requirement to detail layout and scale in outline planning applications. Is this Good news for the profession?

Previous rules demanded applications in which ‘layout’ was a reserved matter to state the approximate location of buildings, routes and open spaces. Where ‘scale’ was also a reserved matter, the application was required to state the upper and lower limit for the height, width and length of each building.

The Government has said that although it understands that it may be beneficial to provide details of layout and scale at the outline application stage, it does not “consider it necessary to nationally mandate this” in all cases where layout or scale could otherwise be reserved.

Planning consultant Amanda Olley, Director of Summit Planning Associates said: “In appropriate circumstances the volume of information required to be submitted with outline planning applications should be significantly reduced, resulting in significant cost savings for applicants and speeding up determination by local planning authorities. It should also help to redress the gradual decline in the use of outline applications.”

“The principle aim underpinning this change should be commended. Parties will be encouraged to focus on the acceptability of the development in principle rather than getting bogged down in the specific detail that is reserved for detailed consideration at a later stage. Information requirements should be more balanced now that requirements to provide building-specific details have been scaled back,”.

Amanda continued; “Of course, the flip side of this approach will be the potential for more disagreements between applicants and local planning authorities when the LPA still considers that a greater detail of information is required with an outline application. This will place even more emphasis on discussing proposals up front with the planning authority to try and agree the level of detail that will be included with an outline application. In those situations where agreement cannot be achieved, the route of recourse and appeal rights of the applicant have not changed. Developers and Planners alike should still expect many local planning authorities to continue asking for details of reserved matters at the outline stage in those circumstances where they will wish to satisfy themselves that they have sufficient information to determine whether the scheme is going to be acceptable in principle.”

Amanda Olley has been a Chartered Town Planner for 12 years and is an expert in her field. For more information, contact Summit Planning Associates via Tel: 01625 801800 or E-Mail: amandaolley@summitassociates.co.uk

The recent announcement by Planning Minister, Nick Bowles MP, unveiling direct cash incentives of up to 25% of the Community Infrastructure Levy (CIL) pot for those communities accepting development in their areas, has been met with mixed opinion and re-opened discussion about the benefits of CIL.

It was the Barker Review of Housing Supply back in 2004 that made significant criticism of the S106 mechanism for securing planning contributions. After the failure to implement an initial recommendation for a tax on increased land values resulting from the grant of planning permission, an alternative proposal for a Community Infrastructure Levy, to be administered and collected by Local Authorities was later introduced.

The basic principle behind CIL is for a more objective mechanism of setting planning contributions associated with development proposals, enabling Local Authorities to better plan for the provision of identified essential infrastructure across their whole Authority area. Supporters of CIL believe it will provide developers with greater certainty on development obligations and should reduce excessive timescales and legal costs incurred through the negotiation of section 106 agreements. However detractors believe that the removal of negotiation and flexibility from the process, particularly in a tougher economic climate, will stifle development if there can be no flexibility on contributions.

Ahead of attending a private briefing by Nick Boles, MP, planning consultant Amanda Olley, Director of Summit Planning Associates, spoke to Property Aspects about what the recent announcement may mean for the future of CIL:

“It is still too early to tell if CIL will improve upon the criticisms levied at the S106 mechanism for securing planning gain and speed up the provision of essential infrastructure across Local Authority areas. To date, only a handful of Authorities have adopted charging schedules allowing them to make collections from qualifying developments.

The continuing stagnant state of the economy is also still only seeing a slow release of new development proposals coming forward. If up to 25% of a CIL pot secured from a qualifying development is to be diverted into the local community pocket, it is difficult to see how, in the continuing economic climate, Local Authorities are going to be left with a sizeable enough pot to implement the provision of their identified essential infrastructure needs in a timely manner.”

She continued: ”The recent announcement may also discourage additional Authorities from proceeding to the adoption of CIL charging schedules, if rates have to be set prohibitively high to offset a 25% diversion to local communities. This may result in a greater retention of the Section 106 mechanism than had previously been anticipated, if Local Authorities perceive this to be a better way of retaining monies collected from planning obligations.”

Amanda Olley has been a Chartered Town Planner for 12 years and is an expert in her field. For more information, contact Summit Planning Associates via Tel: 01625 801800 or E-Mail: amandaolley@summitassociates.co.uk