Fisher German has opened doors for the future development of redundant agricultural buildings. The rural property consultants recently won a landmark planning decision in Staffordshire following a planning appeal and months of negotiation with the local planning authority.
Currently, there is no standard planning policy across authorities with regards to the re-use of redundant agricultural buildings. After looking at all the options for the client, Fisher German recommended that this particular range of barns be converted to residential dwellings, which was consistent with draft planning policy. A last minute change in policy meant that planning permission was refused due to the local authority's preference of converting for "employment uses". Fisher German had to prove that these particular buildings were of no interest for this purpose. They did this successfully and convinced the planning inspector at appeal that there was no demand for employment uses and that residential was the most appropriate use for these buildings. Subsequent negotiations with the planning authority over environmental and design issues resulted in planning permission being granted for conversion and change of use to residential in July 2007. Kay Davies from the Fisher German Ashby office and George Simpson from the Stafford office worked together on the planning and marketing required which resulted in the successful change to current interpretation of East Staffordshire Borough Council's policy.
George Simpson comments "we are finding that every planning authority has a different interpretation of national policy and in this area the authority took a particularly firm stance. We were initially told to market the properties with a joint agent for 12 months to justify that there was no demand for employment uses. Not only did we manage to achieve this turnaround decision without requiring a second agent but we also did so in three months rather than the stipulated 12. The key to the success of this was demonstrating that a genuine attempt to market the property had been made with full exposure and detailed records of the interest received. The outcome of this case sets a very useful precedent, which should be a great help to similar projects in this and other planning districts."
