A Bedford street is losing on-street parking spaces after the Planning Inspectorate’s decision to grant a retrospective planning application for a loft conversion.
Bedford Borough Council had refused retrospective planning for a loft conversion to enlarge flats A and B at 1A Goldington Avenue, Bedford.
However, the Planning Inspectorate subsequently approved this, and also approved a rear drop kerb and access into the rear curtilage for parking as part of the development.
This was refused on highway safety grounds (lack of visibility) by the council.
The council’s planning committee (26 September) was asked to consider a new application for a drop curb following six neighbour objections.
These cited safety issues and a loss of parking on Goldington Avenue.
“The current application is merely for the relocation of the dropped kerb with a two-metre visibility splay either side,” Gideon Richards, team leader development management, told the committee.
“The proposal is considered to be an improvement over the previously approved proposal because the required pedestrian visibility splay is being provided.
“The loss of parking from the street to be taken into private provision is noted.
“And it’s reasonable to conclude that those residents are making use of the on-street spaces, so nothing is lost or gained by allowing the on-site spaces to be created,” he said.
A resident opposed to the application said: “The phrase that you’ve used – nothing lost, nothing gained. We’ve lost two parks minimum, possibly three.
“They’re gaining three private parks, so that doesn’t work if those parks aren’t being used.
“If I’m going to unload groceries and I can’t find a park and their parks are empty, I’ve lost, they’ve gained, that’s year five maths,” he said.
Mr Richards replied: “The point in the report that there’s nothing lost or gained is that current residents of those flat units would have to park on the street.
“So there’s parking happening on-street from those flat users, by creating on-site parking, those flat users can now park on site.
“Which then frees up space on the street which they would have been using, and so there’s nothing lost, nothing gained,” he said.
The resident said: “The lost or gained aspect only works if there are cars parking [on the property], if there are no cars there then we’ve all lost.
“If there’s only one car [parked] there we’ve lost two spots for the street if this was to go ahead
“That doesn’t make any sense, it only works if there are cars [using the spaces],” he said.
Mr Richards said: “We can’t make people park in their parking spaces, that’s true of any property.
“But there is a provision there, they can park on-site, and that’s what’s being proposed,” he said.
Committee members voted to approve the application.
By John Guinn
Local Democracy Reporter
Update: This article was updated on 7 October 2022 at 16:36 after a reader requested the details of one of the objectors to the plans were removed. While all details discussed in this planning meeting are public, we reviewed this request as an individual case and are happy to make this amendment.
