Planning round-up: Two decisions on flat plans in office park

In the planning round-up this week, RBWM has decided on yet more proposals for buildings in Vanwall Business Park - which has faced a slew of piecemeal planning applications to turn its office blocks into flats over the past year.

There are also two small applications for homes in Maidenhead and Windsor. 

For more information, enter the reference numbers into RBWM's online planning portal.

Approved: An office building in Vanwall Business Park has been given approval to be turned into 31 flats.

Vandervell House is the latest of the office buildings to fall to ‘permitted development rights’ – a fast-track process that allowed developers to turn offices into flats more easily.

By meeting national requirements, developers can bypass the full planning process, as long as they only make changes to the interior of the building, and meet other requirements from a checklist.

Since this is national planning law, there is little RBWM can do to stop this – even though it wants Vanwall Business Park to be an employment site.

As such, it is bringing in special protections to try to prevent developers gobbling up the office space for flats so easily.

The Vandervell House application came in at about the same time as the application to do the same thing at the former Costain HQ – which was approved earlier this year.

The Vandervell House conversion will bring in 22 one-bedroom flats, and six two-beds and three three-bed flats.

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Refused: By contrast, another building in Vanwall Business Park has been refused permission to be turned into flats.

The applicants used the fact that several conversions have already been approved in the business park as an argument why it should be permitted.

In their words, the other approvals 'set a precedent for residential development within the business park.'

But this was no help to their plan for 38 flats in Objects House.

This office sits within a sizable area covering more than 98,200sqft. It had been home to business software solutions company SAP UK Ltd.

The building itself is three storeys and provides about 5,825sqm of office floorspace. This would have been turned into 12 one-bed, 12 two-bed and 14 three-bed flats.

To the south is a multi-storey car park which provides 240 car parking spaces. This and the surface level car park would be retained, offering more than enough parking within planning rules.

There are 12 existing sheltered and covered bike stands nearby which can hold 24 bikes. These would have been retained for short-stay visitor cycle parking.

In addition, the developer proposed providing 48 long-stay cycle spaces in a secure cycle store. This would have offered a total of 72.

However, this suggestion was the developer’s downfall, as the construction of any new, external cycle storage area falls outside the scope of this style of application, which allows changes to a building’s interior only.

Other developers have tripped up here before – and if other applications are anything to go by, there is a decent chance the applicants will tweak this part of their application and resubmit it.

They will also have to make changes to demonstrate that all habitable rooms provide adequate natural light. The absence of this was another reason for RBWM's refusal.

24/02274/CLAMA

Refuse: A plan to build two three-bedroom homes in Florence Avenue, Maidenhead, has been turned down.

Currently, the house contains a single four-bed home on a 746sqm site.

It is 'dilapidated and in need of repair', and also 'does not follow the standard design character on the street.'

The applicants wanted to make more efficient use of the site, with two homes that they argued would better match the street's character.

The new homes would each be 138sqm.

But RBWM had concerns that flooding hadn't been sufficiently accounted for, given the area is in Flood Zone 3, the highest flood risk.

There was also not enough information on whether there are protected species on the site that might be disturbed by development.

The applicant was also required by RBWM's policies to show how it would offset its carbon emissions - but failed to do so.

Proposals also 'fail[ed] to secure the required mandatory biodiversity net gain', also against RBWM's policies.

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Pending: Plans are in to convert one home into three one-bed flats at number 4 Haslemere Road, Windsor.

This is a three-bedroom, two-storey semi-detached house on a long narrow plot in a residential area.

There are three parking spaces there and no plans to change this.

Proposals include two one-beds for one person, measuring 45sqm and 41sqm, and the final flat for two people, measuring 62sqm.

The built form changes to the property have been accepted previously by council – a proposed addition of a balcony is the primary physical change not already approved.

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