Planning application drawings in Old Hastings

Householder planning in Old Hastings — the record

Hastings Borough Council granted 90% of the householder planning decisions it made in its latest published year — 3 points above the 87% England-wide householder average. Old Hastings contains Old Town, Hastings, Tillington Terrace, Hastings conservation areas (Old Town, Hastings designated 1968), so materials, fenestration and roof form are assessed against the appraisal, which is where a policy-literate drawing pack earns its keep. Its dominant Victorian (1837–1901), Edwardian (1901–1910) and interwar (1918–1939) housing stock sets the design brief on most streets.

The permitted-development ceilings are fixed: 40m³ of new roof volume for a terraced loft and 50m³ for a semi or detached house under Class B, plus a 3m single-storey rear extension on a terrace or 4m on a detached house under Class A. In conservation areas such as Old Town, Hastings and Tillington Terrace, Hastings those rights are removed, so we confirm your exact address before a line is drawn. A validated householder application in Old Hastings is determined against an 8-week statutory target.

Old Town, Hastings (conservation area designated in 1968) and Tillington Terrace, Hastings (designated conservation area) — these are the Old Hastings pockets our drawings cover most. Heritage designations here include Old Town, Hastings and Tillington Terrace, Hastings. Hastings Borough Council weighs each proposal against Hastings Borough Council's development plan and the design policies it applies to householder applications, where the 2,840 homes here are 56% pre-1900, 10% 1930-1939, 10% 1900-1918, which is what sets the realistic roof and rear-projection options. On roofs the borough is steeply pitched slate roofs, valley gutters and party parapets typical of pre-1900 building and hipped roofs with shallow pitches typical of 1930s building, over Victorian and earlier houses (56% of 2,840 homes), 1930s semi-detached and detached houses (10%) and Edwardian houses (10%).

Old Hastings: the local constraints that decide your scheme

Before anything is drawn we check your address against the designations that apply in Old Hastings: Old Town, Hastings (conservation area designated in 1968) and Tillington Terrace, Hastings (designated conservation area). Inside those boundaries permitted development is curtailed and Hastings Borough Council assesses materials, window detail and roof form against the area's own appraisal, so a scheme that would be waved through two streets away can need a full application here.

No Article 4 direction is recorded for Hastings Borough Council, but Old Hastings's 2 conservation areas still limit permitted development on those streets.

On stock, Old Hastings is Victorian and earlier houses (56% of 2,840 homes), 1930s semi-detached and detached houses (10%) and Edwardian houses (10%) — which is why steeply pitched slate roofs, valley gutters and party parapets typical of pre-1900 building and hipped roofs with shallow pitches typical of 1930s building govern what a loft or rear projection can realistically be. Hastings Borough Council decided 109 householder applications in the latest published year and granted 90%, with 67% issued inside the eight-week target. That decision record, not a national figure, is what we design to.

The full build-period split for Old Hastings runs pre-1900 56% (1,590 homes), 1900-1918 10% (270 homes), 1919-1929 5% (140 homes), 1930-1939 10% (280 homes), 1945-1954 4% (100 homes), 1955-1964 3% (90 homes), 1965-1972 4% (110 homes), 1973-1982 5% (130 homes), 1983-1992 2% (70 homes), 1993-1999 0% (10 homes) and 2000-2008 1% (20 homes). That distribution is why pre-1900 detailing dominates the drawings here, and it is measured from council-tax records rather than assumed from the street name.

Hastings Borough Council also decides for Castle, Central St Leonards and Maze Hill, so a decision in Old Hastings sits inside a wider pattern of decisions we track across the same authority — useful when an officer cites a precedent from the next area over.

What goes in a Old Hastings planning application

Whatever you are building, Hastings Borough Council decides it from the same core set. A location plan at 1:1250 fixes the site on the map with the red-line boundary; a block plan at 1:500 shows the property in its plot; then existing and proposed floor plans and elevations at 1:100 or 1:50 show the house as it is and as it will be. Larger schemes add a section and, where policy requires, a design and access statement. Miss one and the application is returned invalid before an officer has looked at it.

The drawings are also the argument. Hastings Borough Council assesses each proposal against Hastings Borough Council's development plan and the design policies it applies to householder applications, and the elevations are where the case is won or lost — ridge and eaves heights, window positions, materials and how the change reads from the street. On Old Hastings's stock, which runs to Victorian and earlier houses (56% of 2,840 homes), 1930s semi-detached and detached houses (10%) and Edwardian houses (10%), the same scheme is drawn differently to answer the concerns officers raise here. Old Hastings contains Old Town, Hastings, Tillington Terrace, Hastings conservation areas (Old Town, Hastings designated 1968), so materials, fenestration and roof form are assessed against the appraisal, so the pack is built to pre-empt exactly that.

Where the property sits in a conservation area — Old Town, Hastings and Tillington Terrace, Hastings among Old Hastings's — validation is stricter still, often demanding heritage detail and sometimes additional plans. No Article 4 direction is recorded for Hastings Borough Council, but Old Hastings's 2 conservation areas still limit permitted development on those streets. We confirm the designation before drawing so the pack meets the higher bar first time.