The Council was faced with competing sites to accommodate a large part of its plan-led, employment land requirement. We successfully promoted our client’s interest on a 16ha greenfield site.

We subsequently translated the Council’s position into an outline planning permission. To achieve permission it was necessary to gain support from other planning authorities, manage the removal of archaeological constraints, establish a landscape strategy, and coordinate the resolution of highway issues. We also negotiated an extension to an existing bus service (with appropriate implementation triggers). Despite the greenfield location, the Secretary of State did not intervene no doubt because of the robust justification provided.

The reserved matters application for 450,000ft² of B1/B2/B8 space was delayed to within a day of the three year deadline. The submission had, therefore, to be 100% correct in order not to risk voiding the permission. We coordinated the submission of a considerable volume of design and landscape drawings, reviewing everything against the outline permission’s conditions and negotiated with the Council to secure approval ahead of the Council’s target date.