(Attachment: 6)Agenda item - Reigate and Banstead Borough Council

Planning Committee Agenda Item 8
13 April 2011 11/00126/F
properties. Having taken advice from the Council’s Housing Development
Manager, I am satisfied that this would be a satisfactory arrangement in
terms of tenure split and their location.
6.22 The Housing Manager has confirmed that there is a need for an extra care
facility within the Borough and it was envisaged that it would be built within
the North West Sector, which has yet to gain detailed planning approval. The
early introduction of this is welcomed, but as the applicant has not yet
secured an end user for the facility it will be necessary to reserve other parts
of the site for affordable housing in case it does not go ahead. This shall be
secured by a deed of variation to the original Section 106 on the site,
which is currently being drafted.
6.23 Concern has been raised over the layout of the extra care scheme and the
internal arrangements of some of the three-bed units, which would be
identical to the four-bed units but with a study in lieu of a bedroom. The
reason for this is that the applicant needs to provide dwellings of appropriate
scale about the neighbourhood centre, resulting in larger units. They are
firmly of the view that these dwellings will be acceptable to a Registered
Social Landlord and so have not altered the layouts, but the Housing
Manager maintains that this may be an issue. The development must
provide 25% affordable units, ensured by legal agreement, so it is in the
applicant’s interest to design appropriate units. With this in mind I am
inclined to accept the layouts provided. If they were found to be
unacceptable for an end user then an amendment to the permission would be
needed, which could occur at a later date.
Neighbour Amenity
6.24 The proposed layout has been designed so as to afford acceptable levels of
amenity for all future occupants. All dwellings would be of sufficient size
with adequately sized gardens. The majority of dwellings would benefit
from a separate rear access to their gardens. The layout has been assessed by
the Architectural Liaison Officer for Surrey Police in terms of crime
prevention, and he is satisfied that there are no obvious areas that might
encourage crime.
6.25 The flats and flats over garages have little or no private amenity space.
However this is acceptable given the scale and type of units and the provision
of various forms of public open space available for use within close
proximity.
6.26 The overall layout and siting of dwellings has been designed to avoid any
unacceptable overlooking between new dwellings. Where windows would
face one another, or neighbouring gardens, they would be to rooms that
could be obscure glazed to prevent loss of privacy. Dwellings would be sited
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