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Building Activities affecting the Highway
Building Activities affecting the Highway
Extract from Appendix D presented to the Environment and Neighbourhood Overview Panel on the 3 February 2004. Although not a Council Policy, the following outlines the general practice that is followed when dealing with Building Activities.
1. There are a number of general principles/objectives that need to be considered and balanced in developing a practical and successful service outcome. The main issues being:-
A. The use of the highway, to assist in adjacent building activities, is very well established and it would not be feasible to try and stop it.
B. The Highway Act in giving licensing powers to Local Authorities and allowing appeals to the Magistrates’ Court, in certain instances, has recognised the above.
C. Building activities on the highway are commonly as a result of “permissions” granted under Planning Procedures and therefore make it difficult to take a negative approach to them.
D. Equality in licensing considerations.
E. Maintaining public safety.
F. Safeguarding the condition of the highway.
G. The preference to minimise problems by controlling activities with licences rather than trying to enforce after the problems occur. Enforcement is expensive in human as well as financial resources.
H. Maximising potential income, minimising potential costs.
I. Efficient and easily understood application procedures.
2. By taking the above main principles/objectives into consideration a general set of practices have been adopted when dealing with licensing and enforcement i.e.
A. When an application is made, or when someone is found to be undertaking an activity without a licence, the general presumption is that permission will be granted – We will say yes, unless there is a very good reason to say no.
B. We do not discriminate against any applicant unless there is passed evidence that the applicant or their contractor cannot be trusted to abide by the licence conditions.
C. Fees and Charges are reviewed on a regular basis to ensure our costs are reasonably covered. Current Fees and Charges are set out in Annex 1.
D.In March 2002 the Council set an income target of approx. £82k for 2002/03, which was more than double previous years, and this was achieved.
E. With the placing of skips, we have vetted and registered acceptable Companies and application forms are paid for in advance. This results in a significant reduction in administration and financial costs and normally enables a same day response. A skip application form in shown in Annex 3.
F.All licences for building activities are recorded on the Council’s ISIS based mapping computer system. This data will shortly be available to all ISIS users. The system also allows for the required annual return to the Inland Revenue to be easily generated.
G.Where the surface of the highway may be damaged by an activity, a refundable deposit is calculated by area and lodged with the Council. Should damage occur and repair works be required or addition inspections are necessary due to problems, these costs are taken from the deposit.
H. The duration of a licence will depend upon the activity being licensed and the nature of the adjacent building works. For skips, permission is limited to one month with further applications being considered should additional time be required. For most other activities a licence is issued for the period stated by the applicant as being required to undertake and complete the works. For small works this is usually a short period but for some larger works it can run into years e.g. Kingston College, Rotunda.