Impact Justification Reports

Recently I have been producing more and more Impact Justification Reports to support planning applications for alterations to historic and Listed Buildings.

These are reports used in conjunction with a Description and Fabric Analysis Report to show that the proposed scheme will have either a beneficial or non-destructive impact on the historic building.

The impact could be a number of factors -:
- removal or alteration of historic fabric
- change to the external appearance of the building
- creation of a new external unit
- creation of new internal spaces
- insertion of new features such as a staircase for example
- insertion of fire protection

The Impact Justification Report seeks to allay the planners apprehensions that the scheme might be at variance with PPS5 (was PPG 15 or PPG16) and in general uses the fabric analysis to show that minimal disruption will be caused to the historic fabric of the building. The report will also call on historic precedent and other nearby schemes that have been permitted to make a case.

However I am not a miracle worker. Some schemes are over ambitious, under-informed or too destructive to mitigate. It is better to know this before making an application than afterwards.

For an example of a successful IJR click here.