Planning performance statistics: fourth quarter 2017-2018 and annual

13. Major Developments by Planning Authority, 2017/18 - post 3 ^rd August 2009 applications

Cairngorms National Park, Loch Lomond and the Trossachs National Park and Orkney Islands did not make decisions for any major developments in 2017/18 and are therefore not included in the charts in this section.

13.1 Major Developments – by development type, 2017/18

Chart 58 shows information on the case mix for each planning authority, ordered by number of housing applications, then Other Development applications.

Chart 58: Major Developments by planning authority and development type, 2017/18 ¹

1. The number in brackets gives the total number of major development decisions by planning authority (excluding processing agreements). See Section 2 for further details of processing agreements. Where appropriate the percentage of applications for Major housing is shown.

There were 238 decisions made for major developments in 2017/18. In addition, and not shown in the above, 93 decisions were made for major developments that used processing agreements. Glasgow made the most decisions (50) for major planning applications with 28 for housing, 17 for other developments, four for business and industry and one for waste management. In addition Glasgow used processing agreements for a further three major developments. Aberdeenshire made the most decisions for major developments using processing agreements with all 12 applications meeting agreed timescales.

13.2 Major Developments – average decision times, 2017/18

Chart 59 shows the average decision times for major developments ordered by the number of decisions made for major developments in each planning authority. In total there were 238 decisions made on major developments in 2017/18 with an overall average decision time of 33.6 weeks. A further 93 major developments that were subject to a processing agreement are not included in these average decision times.

Chart 59: Major Developments by planning authority, 2017/18: Average decision time (weeks)

Table 8 shows the annual average decision times for major applications for the last five years ( Annual, 2017/18: Table 2).

Numbers of decisions made for major developments are very small compared to those for local developments and the average decision times at local authority level are likely to be volatile. The case mix also has an influence on average decision times. The lengthy average time for major developments in Midlothian was partly due to one application that took over three years for a decision on planning permission in principle for a residential development for 60 dwellings that also included erection of a warehouse and extension to an existing petrol filling station kiosk.

Table 8: Major Applications: Average Decision Time

Due to the small numbers of major applications, especially at local authority level, average times are more variable. However, Aberdeen City, Aberdeenshire and Falkirk have all improved their overall average decision time by over 20% compared to 2016/17.

Percentages that were agreed within agreed timescales can be seen in Table 1 of Planning Authority Performance Statistics 2017/18 Annual.