Right to Light Issue

[webkey]

Hello,

 

Has anyone out there had experience of their neighbours building extensions which have (or had the potential to) caused privacy and light restriction issues to their homes?

 

Our neighbour is proposing such an extension to the back of their terraced house, it doesn't require planning permission but a surveyor has given us a preliminary report advising us that it is likely to have light restriction implications to the rooms at the back of our house (mainly because his home has a higher elevation than ours)

 

The neighbour is prepared to compromise his plans but would like exact calculations so he can adjust his plans with his architect. Unfortunately a surveyor will charge anything between £1K and £3K for these exact calculations so that's a non starter for us

 

We are proposing to write to our neighbour with our suggestion of what we feel is a more appropriately sized extension in light of all of this but in the meantime I thought I'd drop a note here to see if anyone has been in the same situation as us and whether they had any good advice for us?

 

Thanks in anticipation.

 

Regards,

 

David.

[Cyclone]

what sort of extension doesn't need planning permission?

[simondjuk]

what sort of extension doesn't need planning permission?

 

beat me to it Cyclone!!

 

I thought all extensions / buildings over 6ft needed planning permission. Please correct me if im wrong

[webkey]

That was new to me as well, apparently if the extension is <10% total volume of your home then you just need building regulations permission.

 

what sort of extension doesn't need planning permission?

[doodle]

If it's near a boundary it still needs planning permission. I would contact the council and talk to them about the plans to check that your neighbour doesn't need planning permission. If he does, you can then lodge a complaint or whatever it is you lodge to stop it.

 

Found this: http://www.norwich.gov.uk/webapps/atoz/service_page.asp?id=1211 which says if it is less than 2 metres from the boundary it needs planning permission. As a terraced house, I'm guessing he will be less than 2 metres from the boundary. HTH

 

Planning permission may not be needed if:

 

• an extension is less than 50 cubic metres or 10% of the size of the original house or bungalow or if your house is a terrace or is in a conservation area
  
• an extension is less than 70 cubic metres or 15% of the cubic content of the original house or bungalow, if it is detached or semi-detached - up to a maximum of 115 cubic metres, if not in a conservation area
  
• an extension does not cover more than 1/2 of the garden space
  
• an extension does not increase the height of the original roof
  
• an extension is less than 4 metres high and more than 2 metres from any boundary
  
• an extension is in front of the house and more than 20 metres from a highway.
  

[Cyclone]

those are reason it may not be needed, so any single one of those reasons would apply, ie being <10% of the volume of the house.

[Thunzi]

The right to light is a very grey area. Pulled this for you from a guide we've got at work. We don't do natural lighting calculations anymore as they are a pain, £3K sounds far too high though, we used to charge about £400!

 

The right to light is a legal right which one property may acquire over the land of another. If a building or wall is erected which reduces the light in the obstructed property to below sufficient levels, then

the right to light is infringed. The owner or tenant of the obstructed property may sue, either for removal of the obstruction or for damages. This can be costly if a whole building has to be pulled down, and so the question of rights to light should be considered at the design stage.

 

Rights to light can be acquired by a legal agreement, or if the light has been enjoyed without interruption for at least 20 years. If the light is obstructed for more than a year, then the right is usually lost. Sometimes, if windows have received light over adjoining land for nearly 20 years, the owner of the adjoining land may register a ‘notional obstruction’. This is a way of stopping the windows acquiring rights to light over the land when the 20 years are up.

 

Rights to light can also be rescinded by a legal agreement, usually with compensation to the owner of the property whose light is lost. No rights to light may be acquired over Crown land, although the windows of Crown buildings can acquire rights.

 

The right to light is for light from the sky alone. No right to sunlight exists - although there is a precedent for removal of obstructions to a greenhouse - neither is there a right to a view. Also, the right is to a bare minimum of light, in most circumstances well below what is recommended in the British Standard‘ (see Appendix C).

 

The usual way of calculating the loss of light is to compute the sky factor at a series of points on the working plane. In dwellings, the working plane height is usually taken to be 0.85 m (33 inches). The sky factor is the ratio of the illuminance directly received from a uniform sky at the point indoors, to the illuminance outdoors under an unobstructed hemisphere of this sky. No allowance is made for glass losses or light blocked by glazed bars and (usually) window frames; nor is reflected light included, either from interior surfaces or from obstructions outside. The sky factor is, therefore, not the same as the CIE daylight factor (see Appendix C).

 

The rest of it hasn't come through on e-mail properly . It basically says that unless there is a significant amount of reduction in light you won't win a case in court. PM me if you need any more info.

[peterw]

Sorry I can’t add to the advice already given, but something only remotely like this problem occurred in Manchester in 1952, and as a newspaper reporter I was sent to cover it.

 

A man wanted to build a brick outhouse in the back yard of a property he owned. Building regulations being what they were at that time, Manchester City Council, after a lot of arguments with the property owner, curtailed his enthusiasm and decided he could have his building — but only half the size he had originally wanted.

 

In fact, they specified its length and width but never mentioned its height — so he stopped at 30 feet, which he considered to be high enough to show his discontent with the Council’s decision!

 

Despite being threatened with everything except the death penalty, he stood his ground aand the monstrosity stayed for five years until he demolished it on his own accord! Got a good story out of it, and a unique picture showing a building inspector with his mouth wide open — gobsmacked!

[webkey]

Thankyou for all your advice, it certainly helped.

 

Regards,

 

David.

[Mes Energy]

A very delayed reply Im afraid however someone else may find this useful.....

 

Normally the 'servient' party (your neighbour) would pay for these calcs as they stand to lose out more by ignoring a right of light issue. A court can require an obstruction that causes an actionable injury to be removed, even after it's built. Sometimes compensation payments can be made but these can be very high and recent cases has shown that courts may prefer the injunction route.

 

If I was acting for your neighbour I would suggest this would be money well spent as it would be very risky for them to ignore your concerns.

 

MES Energy Services for more info.