Ecology pre-application advice

Stratford District Council logo Stratford District Council (SDC) has a service level agreement with our Ecological Services for the provision of specialist ecological advice to inform their development control decisions.

The advice accords with their saved Local Plan policies EF6, EF7 and Core Strategy: Proposed Submission with Modifications (June 2015), our statutory Biodiversity Duty (under the NERC Act 2006), national guidance under the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) and legal requirements.

It also contributes to the sub-regional Green Infrastructure Strategy and includes the use of Biodiversity Offsetting.

To avoid any unnecessary delays SDC has established an agreement with our Ecological Services to provide a pre-application advice service which will be subject to a fee made payable to ‘Warwickshire County Council’. We can offer advice on the following:

whether the application site is subject to any statutory or non-statutory nature conservation or geological designation
whether there are any protected species or species of principal conservation importance that you may need to consider as part of the application, including the need for specialist surveys
whether there are any other ecological issues you will need to consider
whether there will be a requirement for a Biodiversity Impact Assessment to establish the need for biodiversity offsetting in the event of a net loss to biodiversity as a result of the proposed development.

Ecological Advice Trigger Lists

To help you decide if ecological advice is required or not we have developed two trigger lists. One for Householder applications and one for non-householder

These sheets provide you with a guide as to whether you are likely to need this service or not depending upon the type and extent of development you are looking to submit to Stratford District Council. However, should you wish to discuss an application with us please call 01926 418060.

If you know you will need an ecological survey or the trigger list suggests that you need an ecological survey then we would advise that you commission an Ecological Consultant first and ask them if they would benefit from this service.

Please note: Stratford Planning Officers also use these Trigger Lists to validate planning applications and are not likely to validate an application if they believe an ecological assessment or advice is required and it has not been submitted as part of the application.

Pre-application fees and payment methods

Minor Developments (2-5 dwellings up to 499m2 floor space or development on sites up to .49ha)£324£108Minor Developments (1 dwelling)£136£54Householder (extensions, roof conversions etc) and Listed Building Advice£162£54Agricultural Buildings (any floor space excluding dwellings)£162£54Revision to permitted schemesCharges as above

Pre-application Fees and Payment methods
Development Type	Site visit plus written advice	Written advice	Follow-up requests and written advice
Major developments (10+, 1000m2 or more floor space or development on sites 1ha or larger)	£1080	£864	£54 per hour
Minor Development (6-9 dwelling 500 – 999 m2 floor space or development on sites 0.5 – .99ha)	£432	£216

All costs are inclusive of VAT

Payment Methods

BACS:
Cheques payable to Warwickshire County Council (please include with your submitted plans etc).
Alternatively an invoice can be sent to you.
Please note: payment will need to be received prior to any part of the service being started.

Pre-application advice sheet and application form

To submit a pre-application request please read the pre-application advice sheet below, as it is full of helpful tips as to what will help us provide you with accurate advice.

WCC-SDC Ecology advice sheet (pdf, 267 Kb)
All information (plans, photos etc) needs to be submitted with a WCC/SDC pre-application Form relevant to your build (Non-Householder, Householder and Listed Building).

We will aim to provide you with our advice within 15 working days (subject to the arrangement of a site visit if one has been requested).