“My planning application has come back to me and there’s been an objection about the Highways. They’ve said I need to prove that there won’t be any impact on the highways network. How do I do that? Can you help me?”

This was the first contact iRIS received from a client who wanted to change the use of a former corner shop to a house of multiple occupation (HMO). As first time developers with a small development they had felt confident that they had covered all their bases, and therefore were taken by surprise by this request. Understandably, they didn’t really know where to start, so took to Google to find expert help.

To start with, we explained what the needs were - in this case it was a simple transport statement - and how we would go about doing this, then gave our quote. Once this had been accepted, we set about checking the safety of the local highway network, examined the local parking standards, undertook parking surveys to ensure there was capacity as no off-road parking could be provided, surveyed visibility and road widths and examined the TRICS system to give a reliable prediction of trip rates in and out of the development.

Once our report had been submitted to the planning department, the highways objection was removed and the change of use was able to press ahead.

This process took 10 days from first call to report production. It really can be that simple.