Planning

Most planning matters fall within the Society’s aims to protect and preserve the quality of the local environment. We work closely with Fareham and Hampshire councils to protect the streetscene and character of Portchester. We are very active in all matters concerning planning applications and attempt to suggest improvements where possible. Where applications are obviously detrimental we challenge and object to them – often with considerable success. Portchester includes two very important conservation areas (Castle Street and Cams Hall) in which we strive to preserve the integrity of the environment. But our preservation work also includes the whole of Portchester from the harbour shoreline to the chalk grasslands of Portsdown Hill.

Planning issues are dealt with by a subcommittee which ensures that even in the most detailed submissions a spectrum of members’ opinion is properly reflected. The subcommittee work also ensures that a number of members gain knowledge of the legal aspects of the planning process. We wish to be informed of planning issues of concern to residents and we obtain an excellent response. Please use this website if you have any such concerns – whether you are a member or not.

Portchester Society’s appeal for higher standards in planning applications.

An appeal was made to the Fareham Borough Council’s Planning and Development Control Committee, at their meeting at the Council Offices on 29^th. October 2008, for greater accuracy in the applications for planning consent received from developers.

At an earlier planning committee meeting an application for a terrace of four houses on a site in Cornaway Lane, Portchester, where previously there had been only two dwellings, there were at least five inaccuracies identified by the Portchester Society. In reporting these in a written letter objecting to the development, which was delivered to every member of the planning committee, it was disappointing to note that not one of the committee members thought fit to raise these concerns at the meeting in which the application was considered and approved.

The impression given to observers is that the planning committee and the Council’s Planning Officers are prepared to overlook points of detail in a rush to grant consent.

In the application referred to above the applicant did not own the whole plot of land as described on the application.

The Portchester Society wrote to the council after the meeting to enquire what steps the council were going to take to avoid a repetition of sloppily prepared planning applications, which add nothing to the planning process and wasted planning committee members’ time. Unfortunately they have received no reply to date.

This is not an isolated incident. Planning Officers make assumptions when composing their reports and frequently seem to be unaware of local peculiarities which may have a bearing on their recommendations. The Planning and Development Control Committee have an opportunity to obtain further information about a planning application from the system of deputations which the council allow but this becomes a wasted opportunity if the planning committee do not listen to the deputees.
Kjh 30-10-08

No reply received in response to the Society's complaint about Chairman's refusal to answer questions.

Last October the Portchester Society registered a complaint with Fareham Borough Council about the refusal of the Planning Committee to consider the deputation presented in writing to the entire committee about a Planning Application then under consideration.
It is sad to report that during the past twelve months no satisfactory reply has been received.

Retrospective Planning Appication for the errection of a temporary building at the rear of 16 Sunningdale Road is refused.
An application to build a shed at the rear of a dwelling at 16 Sunningdale Road was refused. The problem with this application is that the wooden building, which the applicant required to extend his garden restricted the public right-of-way.

12-06-09 An application has been registered with FBC for the demolition of an existing dwelling at 157 White Hart Lane and the erection of 2 four-bed and 4 three-bed houses. The Society will enter an objection to this principally on the grounds that the exit from the development onto White Hart Lane will be very close to existing junctions at Rowland Road and Marina Grove. Also the proposed exit is close to a bus stop and a take-away food shop where vehicular vehicles park. Ther is a danger of congestion at this site which is in-conducive to road safety.

23-10-09 A second application has been submitted to FBC for the construction of a reproduction Cams Tidal Mill. This application is made by Cams Hall Estate; the first having been withdrawn earlier this year. The application is for the construction of a buildings representative of the style of the long vanished tide mill which stood on a broadly similar site to the the proposed building and is to contain a restaurant and bar. The present application has sought to meet objections raised to the previous one insofar as landscaping is employed to obsure the car park from the adjacent roadway.