Tuesday 24 March 2015

Shroud adverts on large buildings


I was pleased to see a report of a planning appeal decision earlier this month in London , in which an Inspector had allowed an appeal against the refusal of advertisement control consent for the display of a large shroud advert on the scaffolding around a building awaiting or undergoing refurbishment.

The Inspector very sensibly decided that an advertisement display of this type would be preferable to ‘drab’ sheeting round the building, and that the shroud advert would ‘enliven the street scene’. This seems to have overridden arguments by the LPA that the advert would be a prominent feature close to a conservation area (although not actually in it).

The essential point is that this display will be purely temporary, while the works on the building are being carried out, a fact which many LPAs seem entirely to overlook. Clearly, the inspector was satisfied that any alleged detriment to amenity would be outweighed by the advantage of the ugly plastic sheeting that normally covers such developments being hidden by a lively and attractive advert.

I very much hope that other inspectors will follow this lead, although it would be unnecessary for these matters to be disputed in this way if the Control of Advertisements Regulations were amended to allow temporary shroud advertising of this type where a building is covered in scaffolding and plastic sheeting during building works.

© MARTIN H GOODALL

1 comment:

  1. Anonymous said...
    Martin. Ref shroud advert post 24/3/15. It seems not all inspectors share your view. See attached link
    http://www.planningresource.co.uk/article/1337395/distraction-road-users-prevents-temporary-shroud-advert
    Regards
    John Clarke


    This comment was attached to the wrong post, and so I have moved it.

    I was aware of this decision, but it was based specifically on the highway safety issue, where objections may (possibly) be on stronger found than on the amenity issue.

    But the differing decisions only serve to strengthen the argument in favour of an amendment to the Control of Advertisements Regulations so as to remove inconsistent outcomes to appeal cases by granting deemed consent to these temporary shroud advertisements in future.

    ReplyDelete

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