Writing a Planning Statement for a Dartford application
A Planning Statement explains and justifies your proposal against the development plan. For schemes across Dartford — Dartford, Stone, Greenhithe and Swanscombe and the surrounding area — that means engaging Dartford's own adopted policies on design, character and amenity, plus the NPPF. Buildwise auto-detects site constraints (Metropolitan Green Belt (across the south of the borough, including Dartford Marshes), Urban Area defined as north of the A2 and outside the Green Belt, Thames and Darent flood risk zones and Air Quality Management Areas) from your postcode and writes each section tailored to your site and project type.
Cited to Dartford's actual adopted plan
Buildwise references Dartford's live policies directly — for example design, amenity and character policies such as S1 (Borough Spatial Strategy), M1 (Good Design for Dartford), M2 (Environmental and Amenity Protection) — quoted from the source documents and verified, never invented. As Dartford updates its plan, Buildwise's corpus is updated with it.
- The Dartford Plan — Local Plan to 2037 (adopted 22 April 2024)
How it works
Address + postcode; constraints detected automatically.
Usually under 10 minutes.
Download as PDF, edit online, or send to your client under your practice logo.
Example (excerpt)
"The single-storey design and restrained ridge height directly address scale and massing, ensuring compliance with Policy S1 (Borough Spatial Strategy). Generous separation to the host dwelling with no new facing windows satisfies the amenity requirements engaged by Policy M1…"
Frequently asked questions
Usually not. Across the councils Buildwise covers, a planning statement is a validation requirement only for major applications — several councils do not list it at all, and one asks for it wherever the context and justification need demonstrating. For a householder or small-residential scheme it is optional. It is still the document that argues your scheme against Dartford's adopted policies, which is where most refusals are decided — and where the statutory design and access content applies (major development, or a dwelling or 100m² of new floorspace inside a conservation area or World Heritage Site) Buildwise includes that section too.
Dartford's adopted The Dartford Plan — Local Plan to 2037 (adopted 22 April 2024) policies relevant to your scheme — such as S1 (Borough Spatial Strategy), M1 (Good Design for Dartford), M2 (Environmental and Amenity Protection) — plus the NPPF.
Minutes, versus most of a working day by hand.
The permitted development check is free, for everyone, and signing up costs nothing. Planning statements are £95 each with no subscription; monthly plans start at £249.
Start your Dartford Planning Statement.
The Permitted Development check is free — no card needed. Planning documents are £95 each, with your practice’s logo on every one.
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