Planning · Restrictions
Conservation areas and Article 4 directions
Two designations that quietly remove the permitted development rights most homeowners assume they have — and they vary street by street.
What a conservation area changes
A conservation area is designated by the council for its special architectural or historic interest. Inside one, permitted development rights are restricted rather than removed altogether.
Side extensions lose permitted development status. Cladding the exterior does too. Roof extensions facing a highway are restricted, and there are tighter controls on satellite dishes, chimneys and outbuildings. Felling or lopping a tree requires six weeks written notice to the council even where the tree has no preservation order.
The effect is that a project which would be automatic elsewhere becomes a planning application, with the determination time and the design scrutiny that come with it.
What an Article 4 direction changes
An Article 4 direction goes further: it withdraws specified permitted development rights entirely for the area it covers. Councils use them where they judge that ordinary permitted development would erode an area's character.
The critical thing is that Article 4 directions are drawn tightly. They may cover a handful of streets, or one side of a road, and different directions within the same borough may withdraw different rights. There is no way to reason from 'my borough' to 'my house' — it has to be checked against the property address.
How to find out where you stand
Every council publishes its conservation area boundaries and Article 4 directions, usually as a map on the planning pages of its website, alongside conservation area appraisals describing what the designation is protecting.
We check this for your address before quoting, and we tell you in writing which route the permission takes. It changes both the programme and the cost, so it is the first thing to establish rather than the last.
Designation is not a refusal
Being in a conservation area does not mean you cannot extend. It means the design has to respond to what makes the area special — matching brick and mortar, respecting the rhythm of the rear elevations, keeping the extension subordinate to the original house.
In practice, applications that engage with the conservation area appraisal get consented. Applications that ignore it get refused and then appealed at cost.
This guide describes national rules for England and was written to be accurate at the time of publication. Local designations can restrict them further, and legislation changes. Always confirm the position for your own address with your local planning authority, or ask us to do it in writing.
Answers
Questions we get asked alongside this
Do I need planning permission for building work in London?
It depends on the property type and what is proposed. Many single-storey rear extensions and loft conversions fall under permitted development, but those rights do not apply to flats and are restricted in conservation areas or where an Article 4 direction applies. We check the planning position for your specific address before quoting, and tell you in writing which route applies.
How do you price the work?
From a site survey, written up as a fixed and itemised scope before any deposit is discussed. If something genuinely unforeseen appears once work is opened up, it is priced and agreed in writing before we continue — never added to the final invoice after the fact.
When do I pay?
In arrears of work completed. You pay for work that has been done and inspected, not for work that has been promised. This has been how the company operates since 2008.
Do you handle Party Wall notices?
Yes, where the work requires them. Under the Party Wall etc. Act 1996, notifiable work on a shared wall needs 2 months written notice to the adjoining owner, while excavation near a neighbouring structure and building at the line of junction need 1 month. We serve the notices and manage the award process as part of the job.
Will I get certificates at the end?
Yes. Electrical work is tested and certificated under Part P, and building control issues a completion certificate where an application was required. You receive the handover pack — it is what a buyer's solicitor will ask for when you eventually sell.
How long will it take?
It depends entirely on scope, and we give a programme with the written quote rather than a guess on the phone. What we will not do is start a job we cannot resource, which is the usual reason a build stalls halfway through.
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