Agenda and minutes

To receive any apologies or substitutions for the meeting.

Apologies were received from:

·       Cllr Charles McGrath

·       Cllr Rich Rogers

·       Cllr Nabil Najjar

·       Cllr Sam Charleston

To approve and sign as a correct record the minutes of the meeting held on Thursday 27 July 2023.

The minutes of the meeting held on 27 July 2023 were presented.

Resolved:

To approve as a correct record and sign the minutes.

To receive any declarations of disclosable interests or dispensations granted by the Standards Committee.

There were no declarations.

To receive any announcements through the Chair.

The Council welcomes contributions from members of the public.

Statements

Members of the public who wish to speak either in favour or against an application or any other item on this agenda are asked to register no later than 10 minutes before the start of the meeting. If it is on the day of the meeting registration should be done in person.

The rules on public participation in respect of planning applications are linked to in the Council’s Planning Code of Good Practice. The Chairman will allow up to 3 speakers in favour and up to 3 speakers against an application, and up to 3 speakers on any other item on this agenda. Each speaker will be given up to 3 minutes and invited to speak immediately prior to the item being considered.

Members of the public will have had the opportunity to make representations on the planning applications and to contact and lobby their local member and any other members of the planning committee prior to the meeting. Lobbying once the debate has started at the meeting is not permitted, including the circulation of new information, written or photographic which have not been verified by planning officers.

Questions

To receive any questions from members of the public or members of the Council received in accordance with the constitution which excludes, in particular, questions on non-determined planning applications.

Those wishing to ask questions are required to give notice of any such questions in writing to the officer named on the front of this agenda no later than 5pm on Thursday 7 December 2023, in order to be guaranteed of a written response. In order to receive a verbal response questions must be submitted no later than 5pm Monday 11 December 2023. Please contact the officer named on the front of this agenda for further advice. Questions may be asked without notice if the Chairman decides that the matter is urgent.

Details of any questions received will be circulated to Committee members prior to the meeting and made available at the meeting and on the Council’s website.

To receive details of completed and pending appeals and other updates as appropriate.

The committee received details of the appeal decisions as detailed in the agenda.

It was;

Resolved

To note the appeals report.

Change of use from office/medical use (Class E) to a dwelling (Class C3).

Public Participation

Mr Tony Allen (Agent) spoke in support of the application.

The Senior Planning Officer, Julie Mitchell introduced a report which recommended that the application for Change of use from office/medical use (Class E) to a dwelling (Class C3) be refused. Key details included the principle of development, impact upon residential amenity, Highways (parking), visual and heritage impact and the River Avon SAC catchment. 

The proposed unit was for a 2 bed apartment which did not include a car parking space.

It was noted that there was no objection in principle to the residential use, the objection related to the bedroom window as its location was adjacent to an outside licensed entertainment property.

The application did not include mechanical ventilation which would enable the windows to be fixed closed.

Members of the committee then had the opportunity to ask technical questions of the officer. Details were sought on the operating hours of the licensed premises next to the application site, and the impact that future noise complaints may have on that business.

It was clarified that noise complaints were not dealt with within the remit of the planning process, however under statutory nuisance legislation the Licensing Authority was duty bound to investigate noise complaints and where applicable take action on the operator of a business to remedy the issue, this could be in the form of additional condition applied to an operating licence or even closure.

As set out in the report, a satisfactory conclusion around the conflict of amenity had not been established which would protect the proposed development site from noise associated with the surrounding business premises. A noise protection fence erected through a previous application was in place to protect residents in another location, across the courtyard from the application site and was therefore not intended to or sufficient enough to provide protection to the application site.

The Officer noted that background noise was of a non-specific nature, noise which could not be pinned to one thing or another. 

The Officer clarified that on residential development, conditions were not usually applied which restricted the opening of windows, as it was considered not a standard of amenity to be appropriate. A condition for mechanical ventilation could be applied if the Committee was minded to approve the application, however a scheme for this would need to be provided and approved under delegated authority to the relevant officer.

caused noise and receive complaints in relation to noise. There were no known instances of noise complaints in relation to the application site. Clarity on any prior instances which could had set a precedent in the area was provided, in that there had been other night clubs in the city centre which had caused noise and received complaints in relation to noise. There were no known instances of noise complaints in relation to the application site since the erection of the acoustic screen.

The Committee was advised that there was no provision in planning such as ‘buyer beware’ which could be  ...  view the full minutes text for item 191.

Any other items of business which, in the opinion of the Chairman, should be taken as a matter of urgency 

There were no urgent items