The Round Hill Society

On 9th June 2010, members of Brighton and Hove City Council’s Planning Committee refused Carelet’s application No. BH2010/00083  to build 6 three-storey houses on the greenfield site (to rear of 67-81 Princes Road).

The grounds for refusal of BH2010/00083, which the Council and Round Hill residents attempted to defend during Carelet's subsequent Appeal, were:
1) Failure to meet travel demand (parking)
2) Over development
3) Detrimental Impact on future occupiers due to the proximity to the Hollingdean depot

To access appeal decision, go to BH2010/00083 , filter documents by changing "Show all" to "Appeal Decision", then click on green tab APPLY. Select icon in the "view" column.

Appeal dismissed on parking ground alone

Once the Council's planning committee had already approved a 4-house scheme [BH2009/00847] very near to the Waste Transfer Station, ground 3) for refusal became very difficult to defend.

Point 9. of appeal decision APP/Q1445/A/10/2131115, ignores the fact that glass tipping takes place in the WTS (not the MRF) and is much more disturbing than the noise of trains, but holds the Council to the logic that as soon as you place 4 houses in an industrial noise environment = Application Number: BH2009/00847, then why not two more?

9. The third reason for refusal referred to the impact of noise from the nearby MRF, the activities at which have given rise to complaints about noise and odours from existing residents. The noise climate at the site is dominated by the railway line and the MRF, but the houses in this case would not be any closer to either noise source than those already approved, and there is no evidence that noise levels have worsened since the 4-house scheme was determined. The Council refers to a noise diary from one local resident, but I note that was completed in July 2009 around the time that the previous permission was granted. Moreover, both this and the observations of a local Councillor are unquantified and it is possible that some of the problems highlighted may be addressed through stricter enforcement of conditions relating to the MRF.

 

However, the planning inspector is able to cite Ground 1. Failure to meet travel demand (parking) as sufficient reason for dismissing Carelet's Appeal Ref: APP/Q1445/A/10/2131115. Decision date: 15 February 2011:

She observes in section 18 of her appeal decision that 18. residents accept that, during the daytime, on-street spaces are more readily available in the vicinity of the site, but they consider that overall, the on-street parking which currently takes place has been underestimated by the appellant. Their particular concern is with night time parking when demand is heaviest and when problems of double parking, parking on pavements and close to junctions are exacerbated. This time period has not been covered by the appellants.

Say "no" to more on-street parking stress
Carelet's parking survey - is flawed, out of date and hidden away in their application so nobody could easily find it.

In the document BH2010/00083 Supporting Document Technical Report Part 05, [change "show all" to "supporting document" before clicking the green button APPLY) drawn up before the decision to have residents' parking in the streets around London Road Station, they are still claiming that there is surplus on-street parking in Ditchling Rise and Springfield Road. They have not revised their claim that there are surplus parking places in Ashdown Road after the approval of a proposal involving 2 new houses and 3 flats.

 

Below are some of the transport concerns expressed by Round Hill residents who performed their own survey of the available supply of on-steer parking space in Round Hill. Their study was cited in  Appeal Decision APP/Q1445/A/10/2131115. The appeal inspector treats the findings with some caution as the survey was not carried out by a specialist independent traffic survey company and has not been endorsed by the Highway Authority, although advice on methodology was obtained from the outset from the Council's Principal Transport Planner.

Community Parking Survey

Round Hill local residents felt that their own empirical data may help in persuading the planning inspector to dismiss Carelet's appeal against refusal.

Download the Community parking survey proforma (PDF:) which was successful in getting the appeal against refusal of Application BH2010/00083 dismissed.

Princes Road's 1 in 12 hill where extra parked cars would create a dangeous bottleneck. If every area was fully parked all the time, cars would not be able to exchange parking spaces.

Our own calculations indicate that the transport requirements of the proposed development cannot be met by existing availability in the area. 



The parking situation at 10pm on weeknights in July

Existing demand for on-street parking at peak periods, especially in the late evenings and overnight, already leads many drivers to park in unsafe or unsuitable positions such as blocking pavements or on junctions or yellow lines. This factor, which was not taken into account in the survey provided by the developer, illustrates the lack of suitable parking space.

Full results
Within 200m of the site entrance

Date	Time	Free spaces	Unsuitably parked
______________	________	____________	______________
Wed 14 Jul	21:15	20	4
Wed 14 Jul	23:00	7	n/c
Thu 15 Jul	21:00	12	6
Thu 15 Jul	22:00	7	n/c
Tue 20 Jul	21:40	14	7
Tue 20 Jul	22:00	10	8
Wed 21 Jul	22:00	7	7
Thu 22 Jul	22:00	15	8

Between 200 and 400m of the site entrance

Date	Time	Free spaces	Unsuitably parked
______________	________	____________	______________
Tue 20 Jul	22:00	1	40
Wed 21 Jul	22:00	4	47
Thu 22 Jul	22:00	7	42

Download the full survey including photographs and details of our methodology and surveys.

Community parking survey (PDF, 764kb)

Developer's survey avoids measuring peak demand
12 noon on Wednesday 14th January 2009 is probably represents the time during the week when on-street parking is at its lowest. It is certainly irrelevant to perceived pressures. A second 8 pm survey is taken on the same day, but this is a weekday in mid January! Any Round Hill resident would know that peak pressures are at weekends. At more popular times of the year than mid-January, parking considerately becomes an impossible challenge as the supply of safe/legal parking places in Round Hill does not meet the demand.