Monitoring

The Planning Service produces regular UDP monitoring reports, which include information on the number and type of planning permissions given. Reports 1 and 2 were published in August 1998 and August 2000 respectively and Report 3 was published in September 2001. In addition a supplement to Report 3 was published in February of this year. This includes information on all major schemes permitted by the Council since 1993.

This is a brief summary of the findings of Report Three. All permissions refer to the period 1998-2000 unless otherwise stated.

• Permissions: For the year 2000, dwellings permitted resulted in a net increase of 1517 units. This is an increase of 482 units over the 1999 figure (1109)
• Completions: Completion rates for dwellings are very high, at least 90% for dwellings permitted between 1994 and 1997
• Distribution: Residential activity is highly concentrated in the south of the borough. Clerkenwell in particular accounted for 26% of dwellings permitted
• Tenure: Over 90% of dwellings permitted were provided by the private sector
• Targets: The Council has adopted the target of increasing the number of dwellings by at least 9000 units between 1997 and 2011. Currently from 1997-2000, total permissions stand at 5182, which already meets 58% of the target
• Long Term Trends: Housing Permissions are currently at historically high levels. The net change in housing units permitted in 2000 is over 11 times greater than that permitted in 1999
• Type of Development: Redevelopments constituted the largest proportion of new dwellings units at 61%, changes of use followed at 32%, and finally conversions with only 7%
• Size of Development: The vast majority of housing permissions were for a small number of units. 75% of those permitted were for less than 5 units, with only 5% for 25 units or more
• Dwelling Size: 82% of housing units permitted were for 1 or 2 bedroom units. Family accommodation (i.e. 3 bedrooms or more) only accounted for 7%
  
  

Affordable Housing

• The affordable housing target in the UDP specifically refers to the role of developments of 15 dwellings and over in providing affordable housing. Between 1994 and 2000, 1337 affordable units were provided in schemes of this size, out of a total of 5010 (27%). This is a just above the UDP target of 25%
• 95% of affordable units were provided by redevelopments
• Mobility and Wheelchair Housing: There has been gradual increase in the proportion of mobility standard units built, from 20% in 1998, 30% in 1999 and 40% in 2000. Housing meeting the requirements of the wheelchair standard accounted for 3% of all housing permitted in both 1998 and 2000 although it reached 9% in 1999. Redevelopments provided 75% of all mobility housing and 82% of all wheelchair housing
• Live/Work Units:There has been a steady increase in the number of live/work units permitted, from 4 in 1995 to 58 in 2000. The completion rate from 1995-1998 currently stands at 71%
• Car Parking: Policy T17 of the UDP aims for a maximum of 0.5 spaces per new residential development. This target is met with an average of 0.39 between 1998 and 2000. Schemes are most likely to be car free if they are for changes of use or conversions and are small in size (i.e. 1 to 4 units)
• Loss and Gains of Residential Accommodation: 95% of permissions involved gains to residential, only 18 permissions resulted in a loss
  
  

Retail

• 222 permissions affected the amount of floorspace dedicated to retail uses. Of these permissions, 81% resulted in a decrease of retail use
• Dwelling houses accounted for the greatest loss in retail, followed closely by food and drink
• 10 of the permissions involving loss occurred in the Nags Head Town Centre, and 15 in the Angel Town Centre
  
  

Economic Activity

Business Use:

• 79% of permissions involving business would result in a loss of business floorspace
• 48% of permissions involving loss of business resulted in gains in residential use
• The only use class in this category which provided a positive net change was storage and distribution (B8) which had 17 permissions resulting in gains in floorspace and only 5 resulting in a loss
• The wards experiencing the greatest loss were mostly located in the south of the borough, coinciding with the wards that have had the greatest increase in dwelling units e.g. Clerkenwell and Bunhill
• General Industry
• Over 90% of the relevant permissions would result in loss and 70% of these losses would result in gains for residential use
• Storage and Distribution
• 40% of the loss of floorspace was to residential and 22% of the loss was to business use
  
  

Food and Drink

• A total of 156 permissions in the period 1998-2000 involved a change either to or from A3 (food and drink) class. 122 of these permissions involved gains to this class, whilst 53 resulted in a loss
  
  

Assembly and Leisure

• 22 permissions involved an increase into recreational uses. Currently half of these permissions have been implemented
• Only 6 permissions involved the loss of recreational uses
  
  

Overall Change Between Use Classes

• The clearest trend that has emerged is the huge number of permissions, which involve an increase in residential units (Use Class C3)
• This has coincided with a large number of permissions that have resulted in a decrease of both A1 (retail) and B1(business) uses
• A total of 374 permissions have resulted in the loss of the main employment generating uses (B1, B2 and B8)

In addition to residential use, Financial and Professional Services (A2), Food and Drink (A3), Hotels (C1) and Assembly and Leisure (D2) have had permissions involving a net gain to their use class.

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