Agenda item

8.1

The Director of Development Services submitted a report informing Members of a breach of planning control in relation to the unauthorised use of premises for the storage and hire of skips at 40 Woolley Wood Road, Sheffield and potential breaches at 44 Woolley Wood Road and 11 Hollywell Road.

8.2

The report stated that previously enforcement action had been taken against the property at 40 Woolley Wood Road for the breaking and dismantling of equipment including vehicles and for the storage of scrap metal, pallets and associated machinery and also for the unauthorised use of the highway in the vicinity of 30 to 72 Woolley Wood Road for the open storage of scrap metal on vehicles and for the purpose of storage of commercial vehicles and trailers.

8.3

A recent complaint had been received regarding the use of 40 Woolley Wood Road for the storage of skips and the use of premises as a skip hire business. An officer visited the site and noticed numerous skips stored at the property and a skip loader outside the premises. Skip hire uses do not fall within any use class and were considered to be sui generis use.

8.4

Several requests had been made asking the owner/occupier to stop this use and remove the skips and the skip loader. Assurances had been given by the occupier that the skips would be removed, however, to date the skips and skip loader had not been removed.

8.5

It was considered expedient that this matter was reported directly for enforcement action because of the extensive nature of the problems and the fact that the owner/occupier had been un-cooperative in the past with issues relating to these properties and the Council had had to take enforcement action against the owner to resolve these issues.

8.6

At the time of writing the report there had been no evidence of a breach of planning control in relation to either 44 Woolley Wood Road or 11 Hollywell Road. The concern was that the service of an enforcement notice at 40 Woolley Wood Road may result in the displacement of activity from that site to the other two sites as has occurred in the past.

8.7

44 Woolley Wood Road had previously also been the subject of enforcement action against the property for the storage of scrap metal, pallets and the parking of commercial vehicles, trailers and parking of vehicles associated with the scrap metal business.

8.8

11 Hollywell Road is the formal place of business of the owner/occupier of the business and had not previously been the subject of planning enforcement action as it had permission for a B8 – Storage or Distribution use but it had been the subject of previous complaints. The formation of a skip hire business would however require planning permission as this was a sui generis activity which fell outside the use class.

8.9

RESOLVED: That the Committee:-

(a)

gives authority to the Director of Development Services or Head of Planning to take all necessary steps, including enforcement action, service of a stop notice and the institution of legal proceedings, if necessary, to secure the cessation of the use of the premises at 40 Woolley Wood Road for the storage of skips and skip hire and the removal of skips and skip loaders from the property;

(b)

delegates to the Director of Development Services or the Head of Planning power to authorise the taking of all necessary steps, including enforcement action, service of a stop notice and the institution of legal proceedings, if necessary, to secure the cessation of the use of the premises at 44 Woolley Wood Road or 11 Hollywell Road for the storage of skips, skip hire and the removal of skips and skip loaders from those premises in the event that the evidence of a breach of planning control relating to the running of such a skip hire business from either premises comes into the possession of the Council; and

(c)

delegated authority be given to the Head of Planning, in consultation with the Chair (Councillor Alan Law), to vary the action authorised to achieve the objectives hereby confirmed including taking action to resolve any associated breaches of planning control.