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Dear D.I.Y doctors.

I am new to planning permission and I am worndering if someone could assist in answering the following question ? It would be greatly appreciated.

I am just in the process of applying to my local council for planning permission in order to run a hand car wash. We have carried out a few tests on site but I am hearing so many horror stories about the council rejecting permission mostly for hand car washes due to poor drainage, traffic and no provisions in place to recylce water, noise nuisance e.t.c
what do they mean by recycling water ? Do they mean oersonally working out a system to recylce my water usage ?

This is a basic outline of my particlaur site

I have a small building with sufficient parking for 6 cars
The site is located by a main road but outside the town centre with no schools located nearby and situated around 400 yards back from the main road - there is no chance the water can escape onto the footpath or the road.

Possible problem 1. We wash the cars in q side peice of land which is adjacent to our small building, 2 storm water drains and one foul drain. The foul drain is simply covered by a manhole cover which we have drilled holes into. The drain off water produced from our work tends to run into the storm drain due to the level of the ground - i take it this will be a major setback for us ?

Possible Problem 2. Sometimes we wash the cars away from this peice of sideland and we wash on a car park peice of land, the water from this simply soaks into soil which is part of our land - will the council see this as a problem ?

Possible problem 3. Our site is located directly next to a block of flats but has a 10 ft high brick wall seperating us - will the council start sending letters to these neighbiurs letters so they can choose to object or not ?

Possible Problem 4. The use of pressure washers ? These washers really do give off minimul noise but how will the council view this ?

I know it's a long shot but do you have any advice & what do you think of the problems above ? :?

Thanks in advance

I don't know how your local council deals with things but here's a few pointers from a non-expert.

[quote]what do they mean by recycling water ? Do they mean oersonally working out a system to recylce my water usage ? [/quote]
Probably, although I'm sure they would be happy for you to buy in a system. If it takes 20 litres to wash a car and you wash 100 a day that's 2000 litres of water if you keep running from the mains which is quite a eco footprint to have in today's culture.

[quote]I have a small building with sufficient parking for 6 cars
The site is located by a main road but outside the town centre with no schools located nearby and situated around 400 yards back from the main road - there is no chance the water can escape onto the footpath or the road. [/quote]
I think the proximity to the road is more a question of wether you will cause tailbacks by having car's queueing on the public road.

[quote]Possible problem 1. We wash the cars in q side peice of land which is adjacent to our small building, 2 storm water drains and one foul drain. The foul drain is simply covered by a manhole cover which we have drilled holes into. The drain off water produced from our work tends to run into the storm drain due to the level of the ground - i take it this will be a major setback for us ?[/quote] Yes, the water you produce will (I guess) be contaminated with some kind of detergent which must not be allowed into a storm drain. As you hint above I guess the council want's you to collect, purify and reuse the water rather than putting it into the foul drain either.

[quote]Possible Problem 2. Sometimes we wash the cars away from this peice of sideland and we wash on a car park peice of land, the water from this simply soaks into soil which is part of our land - will the council see this as a problem?[/quote]
Again I assume the council want's you to capture the water but if not the I don't think you would be allowed to soak contaminated water into the soil.

[quote]Possible problem 3. Our site is located directly next to a block of flats but has a 10 ft high brick wall seperating us - will the council start sending letters to these neighbiurs letters so they can choose to object or not?[/quote]
If the neighbours are within the defined limits for notifications then yes they would be notified, otherwise they may see the site notice you will be required to display. If you are not creating a nuisance then any objections should not be a major issue. Surely they would rather a carwash than a wasteland next to their flats.

[quote]Possible Problem 4. The use of pressure washers ? These washers really do give off minimul noise but how will the council view this? [/quote]
I guess this may be the only grounds for complaint that the neighbours have. It may be up to you to prove that you are not creating a noise nuisance, I suspect that you would not be allowed to operate 24hours for instance.

I hope this is some help but my best advice would be to call your local council's planning department before submitting any application to check what the likely outcome is.