Block Management in Wotton-under-Edge

The published Wotton-under-Edge ward figure is 373 flats among 2,975 households, 12.5 per cent, but the ward is materially larger than the town and the figure understates it. Only 2,229 of the ward's households, 74.9 per cent, lie inside the built-up area. Narrowing to the town itself gives 2,229 households and 359 flats, 16.1 per cent, made up of 219 in purpose-built blocks, 50 in a converted or shared house, 36 in another converted building and 54 over commercial premises. So the town's real flat share is about a third higher than the ward number suggests.

An Article 4 direction issued by the Secretary of State on 2 April 1993 applies here, and it is unusually far-reaching for a small town. It removes permitted development rights for the enlargement, improvement or other alteration of a dwellinghouse, for roof enlargements and any other alteration to a roof, for the erection of a porch outside an external door, and for the installation, alteration or replacement of a satellite antenna. Between them those cover most of what an owner would normally want to do to the outside of a building without applying. The direction is property-specific rather than area-wide, and the council publishes the schedule: it names buildings on Bear Street, Bradley Street, The Chipping, Church Street, Coombe Road, Culverhay, Dyers Brook, Gloucester Street, Haw Street, the High Street, Long Street, Ludgate Hill, Manor Lane, Market Street, Old Town, Potters Pond, School Lane, Symn Lane and Valley Road. Because it works building by building rather than street by street, the address has to be checked against the schedule rather than assumed from the street name.

This sits outside the lease entirely, but it still reaches us: satisfying the council is not the same as obtaining consent under the lease, and a leaseholder generally needs each.