CHIS Update on satellite dishes
Maggie ShaplandI have been in helpful communication with Jon Bishop, Co-ordinator Planning Enforcement Team Tel: (0117) 922 3004 jon.bishop@bristol.gov.uk
Jon confirmed that planning permission is required in a conservation area if the dish is on a wall that faces onto and can be seen from a road.
- If a dish is visible but positioned on the side wall rather than the front wall, it benefits from permitted development if it is occupied as a single dwellinghouse and not listed. The dish may not an intrusive feature within a visually varied and busy streetscene.
- 4a Boyces Avenue is the subject of a separate investigation and raises different issues as the dishes are positioned on the front elevation of a listed building. An enforcement order has been raised and one has already been removed
- I asked some satellite dish installers (white van with no company logo) who had already put three dishes on the front of Queens Court at first floor level who said they had asked permission- I had a look at the planning page and they did not appear to have put in an application. I queried why they could not put them on the roof so they cant be seen?
Jon had a look at Queens Court . There were at least 12 satellite dishes that he could see but because of the fussy design and bulk of the building these were not obvious at first glance. He found the array of television aerials mounted along the rail at roof level to be far more harmful to the appearance of the building than the dishes. Also, on a general note, he thought the modern small satellite dish is generally a lot less visually intrusive and neater than many of the traditional tv aerials which can look most unsightly. Furthermore, planning permission is not normally required for traditional tv aerials and these have fallen outside of planning controls.
Any investigation into the satellite dishes at Queens Court would involve much work in terms of establishing addresses, ownership and whether or not they have been there for more the 4 years, in which case they would be immune from possible action. - Jon would rather focus resources where there is obvious harm, for instance where the dishes are located on important elevations of listed buildings or in prominent positions on important non-listed buildings in conservation areas but would welcome our views on this approach.
- On a general note, the Enforcement Team has tried to get the message through to Sky about the rules and regulations relating to satellite dishes. The problem seems to be that the message does not get through to the contractors on the ground that carry out the installations or perhaps they are dictated to by their customers who are unaware of the rules.
- One way forward may be to place an article in the 'Our City' (distributed to all households in Bristol) to raise public awareness of the rules and matters to be taken into consideration when locating a dish. He will try to do this over the next month or two.