Galloper Wind Farm Project - National Infrastructure Planning

2842_SLVIA
Assessments are informed by viewpoints which are located on routes and by
site visits and reference to aerial photography to ascertain the likely extent
and nature of views available from the routes.
Residential Amenity
Views from private property are not a material consideration in determining
planning applications unless the proposed change is sufficiently unpleasant
or intrusive to cause unacceptable harm to residential amenity. For this
reason, bearing in mind the distance from the coastline of offshore wind farm
developments, the effects upon individual residential properties is not
assessed.
13) Cumulative Assessment
The purpose of the cumulative effect assessment is to consider the potential
effects upon the seascape and visual environments in relation to the existing
wind farm developments and other known consented and proposed wind
farm developments in the area. It raises questions over thresholds of
acceptable change (spatial and temporal) and the landscape/seascape’s
capacity to accept change.
The Guidelines for Landscape and Visual Effect Assessment (2nd edition,
2002) advises that:
‘cumulative landscape and visual effects result from additional changes to
the landscape or visual amenity caused by the proposed development in
conjunction with other developments (associated with or separate to it), or
actions that occurred in the past, present or are likely to occur in the
foreseeable future.’
A search area from the proposed offshore wind farm site is agreed with the
local authority. Within the agreed radius, all relevant local planning
authorities and appropriate statutory consultees are contacted to identify
existing and consented wind turbine developments, both on and offshore, as
well as applications yet to be determined. For each of these schemes
agreement is reached with the Local Planning Authority as to whether they
should be included in the assessment. Initial cumulative ZTVs, showing the
likely areas where schemes may be visible may be used to inform such
discussions.
Schemes which are in scoping or recent refusals (which may yet be appealed)
are also noted, but are not included within the assessment unless they
become active applications before the LVIA is completed.