Change Of Use
Change of use within the same class does not represent development and therefore does not require planning permission. Changes between classes and orders do require planning permission. However under the General Permitted Development Order (GPDO) there are certain changes between classes which are permitted without planning permission. These are as follows;
From
To
A2 Professional and Financial Service - When premises have a display window at ground level
A1 (shop)
A3 Restaurants and Cafes
A1 or A2
A4 Drinking Establishments
A1 or A2 or A3
A5 Hot Food Takeaways
A1 or A2 or A3
B1 Business (limited to 235 square metres of floor space)
B8 (storage and distribution)
B2 General Industrial
B1 (business)
B2 General Industrial (limited to 235 square metres of floor space)
B8 (storage and distribution)
B8 Storage and Distribution (limited to 235 square metres of floor space)
B1 (business)
Any changes outside of the Use Class as well as structural changes do require planning permission.
What Is B Class Planning Usage?
Find out the exact details of B use classes:
Use Class B1: What is B1 Planning Usage?
Business
B1 building use is use for all or any of the following purposes:
(a) as an
office other than a use within class A2 (financial and professional services),
(b) for
research and
development of products or processes, or
(c) for any industrial process, being a use which can be carried out in any residential area without detriment to the amenity of that area by reason of noise, vibration, smell, fumes, smoke, soot, ash, dust or grit.
Use Class B2: What Is B2 Planning Usage?
General Industrial
B2 building use is for the carrying on of an industrial process other than one falling within class B1 above or within classes B3 to B7 below.
Use Class B3: What Is B3 planning Usage?
Special Industrial Group A
B3 building use is for any work registrable under the Alkali, etc.
Works Regulation Act 1906[5] and which is not included in any of classes B4 to B7 below.
Use Class B4: What Is B4 planning Usage?
Special Industrial Group B
B4 building use is for any of the following processes, except where the process is ancillary to the getting, dressing or treatment of minerals and is carried on in or adjacent to a quarry or mine:
(a) smelting, calcining, sintering or reducing ores, minerals, concentrates or mattes
(b) converting, refining, re-heating, annealing, hardening, melting, carburising, forging or casting metals or alloys other than pressure die-casting
(c) recovering metal from scrap or drosses or ashes
(d) galvanizing
(e) pickling or treating metal in acid
(f) chromium plating
Use Class B5: What Is B5 planning Usage?
Special Industrial Group C
B5 building use is for any of the following processes, except where the process is ancillary to the getting, dressing or treatment of minerals and is carried on in or adjacent to a quarry or mine
(a) burning bricks or pipes
(b) burning lime or dolomite
(c) producing zinc oxide, cement or alumina
(d) foaming, crushing, screening or heating minerals or slag
(e) processing pulverized fuel ash by heat
(f) producing carbonate of lime or hydrated lime
(g) producing inorganic pigments by calcining, roasting or grinding
Use Class B6: What Is B6 Planning Usage?
Special Industrial Group D
B6 building use is for any of the following processes:
(a) distilling, refining or blending oils (other than petroleum or petroleum products)
(b) producing or using cellulose or using other pressure sprayed metal finishes (other than in vehicle repair workshops in connection with minor repairs, or the application of plastic powder by the use of fluidised bed and electrostatic spray techniques)
(c) boiling linseed oil or running gum
(d) processes involving the use of hot pitch or bitumen (except the use of bitumen in the manufacture of roofing felt at temperatures not exceeding 220°C and also the manufacture of coated roadstone)
(e) stoving enamelled ware;
(f) producing aliphatic esters of the lower fatty acids, butyric acid, caramel, hexamine, iodoform, napthols, resin products (excluding plastic moulding or extrusion operations and producing plastic sheets, rods, tubes, filaments, fibres or optical components produced by casting, calendering, moulding, shaping or extrusion), salicylic acid or sulphonated organic compounds;
(g) producing rubber from scrap
(h) chemical processes in which chlorphenols or chlorcresols are used as intermediates
(i) manufacturing acetylene from calcium carbide
(j) manufacturing, recovering or using pyridine or picolines, any methyl or ethyl amine or acrylates
Use Class B7: What Is B7 Planning Usage?
Special Industrial Group E
B7 building use is for carrying on any of the following industries, businesses or trades
(a) Boiling blood, chitterlings, nettlings or soap
(b) Boiling, burning, grinding or steaming bones
(c) Boiling or cleaning tripe
(d) Breeding maggots from putrescible animal matter
(e) Cleaning, adapting or treating animal hair
(f) Curing fish
(g) Dealing in rags and bones (including receiving, storing, sorting or manipulating rags in, or likely to become in, an offensive condition, or any bones, rabbit skins, fat or putrescible animal products of a similar nature)
(h) Dressing or scraping fish skins
(i) Drying skins
(j) Making manure from bones, fish, offal, blood, spent hops, beans or other putrescible animal or vegetable matter
(k) Making or scraping guts
(l) Manufacturing animal charcoal, blood albumen, candles, catgut, glue, fish oil, size or feeding stuff for animals or poultry from meat, fish, blood, bone, feathers, fat or animal offal either in an offensive condition or subjected to any process causing noxious or injurious effluvia
(m) Melting, refining or extracting fat or tallow
(n) Preparing skins for working
Use Class B8: What Is B8 planning Usage?
Distribution or Storage
B8 building use is for storage or as a distribution centre.
