Amendments to the Town and Country Planning Regulations

Important changes to the requirements for making applications for Reserved matters approval come into force on 31 January 2013, by way of an amendment to the Town and Country Planning ( Development Management Procedure ) Order 2010. The changes to the regulations provide even more flexibity to the applicant to agree the specific detail of reserved matters at a later stage. The key points are set out as follows :-

• The existing regulations set out the procedure for outline planning applications and allows for specific details of the application to be reserved for subsequent approval by the local planning authority at a later stage (reserved matters).
• Currently, where layout is a reserved matter, the outline application must state the approximate location of buildings, routes and open spaces. Where scale is a reserved matter, the outline application must state the upper and lower limit for the height, width and length of each building.
• However for applications made on or after 31 January 2013, where layout and scale are reserved matters, the Order removes the requirement to provide these details in the outline application.