Help me object to a new care home being built next door

[rich350z]

Pothole said:

If they're oldies they won't be able to see the curtains in their own windows let alone into yours.

Ha, made me smile.

[rich350z]

Hoofy said:

I don't know if this is any help but it may well be worthwhile considering the kind of people living there. If they are mainly elderly, they will just be staring up at the ceiling from their beds so you're very unlikely to have people actually stand at the window and look down into your garden as you sunbathe.

Also, having a look at gmaps, you already have neighbours who can see into your back garden.




On the other hand, if it's mainly people who are physically capable but mentally unable to look after themselves, you may see a lot of old blokes' willies.

Edited by Hoofy on Wednesday 16th January 23:02

Yes we are overlooked but not anything like to this extent.

As I said its all a bit of a shock so i might be over worrying about it all, but it is a bloody big building to have next door.

Hopefully no willies will be seen!

[Hoofy]

rich350z said:

Hoofy said:

I don't know if this is any help but it may well be worthwhile considering the kind of people living there. If they are mainly elderly, they will just be staring up at the ceiling from their beds so you're very unlikely to have people actually stand at the window and look down into your garden as you sunbathe.

Also, having a look at gmaps, you already have neighbours who can see into your back garden.




On the other hand, if it's mainly people who are physically capable but mentally unable to look after themselves, you may see a lot of old blokes' willies.

Edited by Hoofy on Wednesday 16th January 23:02

Yes we are overlooked but not anything like to this extent.

As I said its all a bit of a shock so i might be over worrying about it all, but it is a bloody big building to have next door.

Hopefully no willies will be seen!

As per your other post, it certainly isn't of keeping with the rest of the street. From gmaps, I can see that all the houses are bungalows and the current home is a bungalow with a window in one of the roofs. I'd be questioning it too.

[Pheo]

You need to refer to planning policy, local plans etc and object on the basis of a valid breach of those.

[Antony Moxey]

A bit trite but if they flipped the floor plans with the centre line of the flip being an east-west line then the building would be a fair distance from your property while still maintaining all its planned dimensions. Obviously it would move it closer to your neighbours to the south, but the only building they'd appear to be overlooking would be their garage.

[Alucidnation]

Surely you would have found out about this whilst purchasing the property?

[rich350z]

Antony Moxey said:

A bit trite but if they flipped the floor plans with the centre line of the flip being an east-west line then the building would be a fair distance from your property while still maintaining all its planned dimensions. Obviously it would move it closer to your neighbours to the south, but the only building they'd appear to be overlooking would be their garage.

Yes this would be better (for me!), but the direction of the sun means that the building is better the way its been designed, unfortunately.

[rich350z]

Alucidnation said:

Surely you would have found out about this whilst purchasing the property?

No the planning application only went in yesterday.

May be i wasn't clear, I'm looking for advice in objecting to the planning application.

Thanks.

[outnumbered]

Alucidnation said:

Surely you would have found out about this whilst purchasing the property?

Given that he's lived there 18 months, and the planning application is dated 24 Dec 2018, that would have been a good trick.

[CPWilliams]

I can't offer any advice i'm afraid, but having put your address into Google and seeing the photos on Zoopla of the back garden as it currently is, i'd be pretty upset about this too.

I'd feel awfully overlooked with it next door, whereas the current building, whilst closer, it fine.

Hope you find a way, but BUPA will have been through this 100 times before.

Edit: oh it's not BUPA, but whoever it is will be well versed in planning.

Edited by CPWilliams on Thursday 17th January 16:56

[Chainsaw Rebuild]

I have just had a thought: could you and your neighbours club together and pay a local architect to write the objection for you as a group of concerned residents? they will know all the grounds you could object on..

[blueg33]

To be honest the proposal is pretty good use of the site and overall a much better design than the existing care home.

I think that is you really want to object, you focus on the massing of the front elevation as that is considerably bigger the the existing development and out of keeping with the character of the rest of the road by virtue of its size. The separation distances between the windows on the development and neighbor's habitable rooms look to be acceptable under the planning policies.

Having said that, as a developer of retirement living, supported living and care homes, I would have done much the same design and would be confident of getting consent. (In 20 developments pa for the last 5 years we have only had 1 refusal).

At 58 bedrooms the economic model for a care home is barely viable, you are lucky that they haven't done more on the second floor.

I currently have an application running in York on a similar type of road (not this one). Our massing is similar and officers support the proposal.

[gmaz]

Yeah you need to get together with your neighbours and list all the possible objections such as parking, noise, light, obstruction of natural light, invasion of privacy etc and then voice your objection on the planning website.

It may still go ahead but with changes to accommodate your concerns, e.g. more on-site parking.

Either that or find a rare species of bat and stick them in the existing building's lofts.

[Equus]

gmaz said:

Yeah you need to get together with your neighbours and list all the possible objections such as parking, noise, light, obstruction of natural light, invasion of privacy etc and then voice your objection on the planning website.

It may still go ahead but with changes to accommodate your concerns, e.g. more on-site parking.

Parking provision is a simple calculation - they're unlikely to have got it wrong.

You're not going to get far with any of the other issues there, either. Note that noise and disturbance from construction impacts carry very little weight (although the Planners can ask for Site Management Plans and limit working hours) - and you're not realistically going to be able to argue operational noise impact from a nursing home; the residents are unlikely to be partying into the early hours on a regular basis.

Avoid anything that's not a material consideration - the Planners simply aren't allowed to give such things any weight, and it just makes you look like a NIMBY.

As blueg33 has said, you might try making an argument on scale and massing of the building being out of keeping with the streetscape, and perhaps with the dominance of the parking, but scale and massing is weak, since it's set back so far from the street frontage, and parking can easily be addressed with a bit of tree planting to break things up.

...but to be honest, it looks like a pretty reasonable scheme, and I'd expect it to be passed without too much difficulty.

[blueg33]

gmaz said:

Yeah you need to get together with your neighbours and list all the possible objections such as parking, noise, light, obstruction of natural light, invasion of privacy etc and then voice your objection on the planning website.

It may still go ahead but with changes to accommodate your concerns, e.g. more on-site parking.

Either that or find a rare species of bat and stick them in the existing building's lofts.

Op don’t listen to this. Bullst non material objections will be ignored. Many of the things in the list are non material in planning. Eg rights to light is a legal easement not planning.

All bats are protected and disturbing them eg placing them in a building is illegal.

[rich350z]

blueg33 said:

To be honest the proposal is pretty good use of the site and overall a much better design than the existing care home.

I think that is you really want to object, you focus on the massing of the front elevation as that is considerably bigger the the existing development and out of keeping with the character of the rest of the road by virtue of its size. The separation distances between the windows on the development and neighbor's habitable rooms look to be acceptable under the planning policies.

Having said that, as a developer of retirement living, supported living and care homes, I would have done much the same design and would be confident of getting consent. (In 20 developments pa for the last 5 years we have only had 1 refusal).

At 58 bedrooms the economic model for a care home is barely viable, you are lucky that they haven't done more on the second floor.

I currently have an application running in York on a similar type of road (not this one). Our massing is similar and officers support the proposal.

Thanks for your reply.

I've a couple of questions though if you don't mind. One thing that i had thought of already is the 2nd floor; I know you can't predict what the developer is thinking, but with them using the second floor at the front of the building and the ridge height being the same all along the building, what is to stop them from putting a couple of Velux's in the rest of it and then using this space later?

I'm meeting the planning officer here tomorrow, is it as simple as asking him directly if he supports it or not? Will they answer, or do you know because this is what you are paid to 'know'?

Thanks

[rich350z]

Equus said:

Parking provision is a simple calculation - they're unlikely to have got it wrong.

You're not going to get far with any of the other issues there, either. Note that noise and disturbance from construction impacts carry very little weight (although the Planners can ask for Site Management Plans and limit working hours) - and you're not realistically going to be able to argue operational noise impact from a nursing home; the residents are unlikely to be partying into the early hours on a regular basis.

Avoid anything that's not a material consideration - the Planners simply aren't allowed to give such things any weight, and it just makes you look like a NIMBY.

As blueg33 has said, you might try making an argument on scale and massing of the building being out of keeping with the streetscape, and perhaps with the dominance of the parking, but scale and massing is weak, since it's set back so far from the street frontage, and parking can easily be addressed with a bit of tree planting to break things up.

...but to be honest, it looks like a pretty reasonable scheme, and I'd expect it to be passed without too much difficulty.

Thanks for the link and the benefit of your experience in these matters.

[rich350z]

I don't know if it makes any difference but an application to build a similar sized care home about 50m away was turned down in 2009 and again by appeal in 2010. Could this be any basis for my argument to turn this down?

https://planningaccess.york.gov.uk/online-applicat...

REASONS FOR REFUSAL:
1 It is considered that the proposal, by virtue of the size and extent of the building footprint
and its excessive scale and massing, would adversely affect the amenity and outlook of the
occupiers of adjacent residential properties and would be unduly harmful to the character and
appearance of the area. Thus it would conflict with Central Government advice on design contained
within Planning Policy Statement 1 ("Delivering Sustainable Development") and policies GP1, GP10
and C1 of the City of York Draft Local Plan.

[Mikebentley]

rich350z said:

Mikebentley said:

BUPA purchased a detached house opposite me years ago and land. They built a 65 room care home in its place. Problems we have are parking mainly and intrusive lighting. They have 65 rooms and staffing to suit and only 12 spaces. Exterior lighting had to be toned down too as it’s like midday outside at midnight. Good luck but these groups have lots of legal support.

Thanks for the info, i hadn't thought to count the car parking spaces. I will now.

During planning application process an assumption was made that 85% of staff would use public transport. This has not happened and the demographic as ours is dementia specialist means lots of partners who really shouldn’t still be driving parking badly everywhere. You must really push the parking angle based on number of rooms and staffing levels. They will try and get the maximum rooms they can to maximise profit.

[Equus]

rich350z said:

I'm meeting the planning officer here tomorrow, is it as simple as asking him directly if he supports it or not? Will they answer, or do you know because this is what you are paid to 'know'?

There's no reason he shouldn't answer, assuming he has actually formed an opinion already (but do bear in mind that many Planners like to simply collate all the information they can, including statutory consultee and public responses, before they even so much as look at the plans, so it's possible that he genuinely hasn't formed an opinion yet).

Also bear in mind that he'll have a Team Leader, who he will sit down and review the application with before finalising his recommendation, and quite often the Team Leader's views will differ, or influence the Case Officer. And Staututory Consultee responses also carry a lot of weight, and he may not know what those are yet... so he will probably be reluctant to commit himself too firmly, at this stage, even if he does have views of his own.

But in due course, he'll be writing an 'Officer Report', which will give his recommendation on whether to approve or not, and set out in considerable detail his reasoning behind that recommendation. This is a public document; there for everyone to see.