Design and Access Statement
Explains the design thinking behind a scheme and how people will get to and around it. Required by statute for certain applications, and the first thing a design officer reads.
When
When your council will require it
- Development in a conservation area comprising one or more dwellings, or 100 square metres or more of floorspace
- Major applications
- Minor schemes of more than one dwelling
- Listed building consent applications
Contents
What is in it
- 01Use: what the development is for
- 02Amount: how much of it there is
- 03Layout: how the buildings and the spaces between them relate
- 04Scale: height, width, length, and why those
- 05Landscaping: what happens to the ground
- 06Appearance: materials, detailing, and the reasoning
- 07Access: how people arrive, enter, and move through, including inclusive access
Authority
What makes it necessary
Article 9(2) of the Town and Country Planning (Development Management Procedure) (England) Order 2015 sets out when one is required. The conservation-area limb catches a single new home, which is one of the commonest shapes of application and the one most often missed.
Price
What it costs
This document is not priced on its own. It is part of the fixed fee for the application it supports, and a case producing three documents costs the same as a case producing one. On a minor application that fee is £1,995, with your council’s statutory fee passed on separately at cost.
A shorter research draft of this document is also available for credits, for your own use. It is clearly marked on every page as not for submission, and it carries nobody’s signature.
Questions
Questions
Is a Design and Access Statement required for a householder extension?
Not for works to a single existing dwelling outside a conservation area. The Planning Statement carries the design case there. Inside a conservation area the statutory trigger can bite, and Wren adds it automatically when your site meets the article 9(2) test.
What happens if I leave it out when it is required?
The council refuses to validate the application. It never reaches an officer, and the clock never starts. This is one of the most common reasons an application is bounced.
Start here
Does your site need a design and access statement?
Draw a boundary and the appraisal tells you which documents your route and your constraints require, before you commit to anything.