Planning Research
It's important to understand how the planning system works in practice in order to inform Historic England's support and guidance. This page introduces a number of pieces of planning research which Historic England has undertaken or commissioned.
Evidence-Gathering Report: Context and Messaging
Earlier in 2023, the Historic Environment Protection Reform Group (HEPRG) commissioned an evidence-gathering exercise to provide evidence on the current functioning of the planning system in relation to applications involving designated heritage assets and sites of archaeological interest. This exercise was designed to provide a ‘snapshot’ of statistical information about heritage-related planning and listed building consent applications, made to a sample of local planning authorities, over two two-week periods in 2022.
The report concludes that the system is under increasing strain and that the effects of this are felt with varying degrees of severity across local planning authorities. It is also clear that determination times for both planning and listed building consent applications have lengthened, although the vast majority of applications that progressed as far as a decision were granted.
The causes of the increase in delays are likely to be complex and require further research (see below), but this report does identify two of the more obvious contributing factors:
- Local capacity: it is impossible to avoid the inference that reduced access to expert advice causes delays and there is a need better to understand the impact of cuts to service quality.
- Heritage Statements: whilst these are meant to aid the planning application process, the report concludes that their quality is patchy and needs improvement to help improve effective decision-making – ‘…heritage statements remain a poorly understood and implemented component of the heritage planning system.’
The immediate next step has been to commission a further stage to the research that will drill down more specifically on the causes of the delays identified. This will then inform HEPRG’s discussion around developing practical proposals designed to improve the effectiveness of the heritage planning system.
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The Heritage Dimension of Commercial Renewable Energy Development in PlanningPublished 9 July 2021Overview of how to better understand the consideration of heritage within the planning process in relation to renewable energy applications.
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Archaeology and Planning Case StudiesPublished 29 August 2019
Evidence base of case studies demonstrating how heritage assets with archaeological and historic interest are managed within the planning system.
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Listed Building Consents: A Review of DataPublished 14 January 2015
A review of data on listed building consents was commissioned to give a statistically robust insight on trends in listed building consents over a three year period, March 2011 - March 2014.
The Heritage Dimension of Planning Applications
This Historic England research reviewed just under a thousand planning and listed building consent applications across the country, to explore the ‘heritage dimension’ of planning activity. Specifically, the research looked at:
- The frequency with which heritage assets feature in such applications
- How they feature
- What impact the inclusion of heritage assets within a proposal has on the processing and determination of these applications
Heritage in Planning Decisions: The NPPF and Designated Heritage Assets
Historic England commissioned Green Balance to review decisions on planning applications relating to designated heritage assets, and to determine whether or not:
- The heritage policies of the National Planning Policy Framework are being implemented
- The decisions are having the desired effect of protecting and enhancing the historic environment
