How likely is my planning application to get approved in Richmond upon Thames?

Most homeowners assume planning permission is a simple yes or no — submit the application, wait eight weeks, get an answer. In Richmond upon Thames, it's rarely that straightforward. The borough has layers of overlapping constraints that make two properties on the same street genuinely different cases, and WhatCanIBuild exists precisely because those differences are almost impossible to untangle without looking at your specific address.

The borough's complexity is unusual — even by London standards

Richmond upon Thames is one of the most constrained boroughs in England. Kew Gardens' UNESCO World Heritage Site status creates a buffer zone that influences planning decisions in ways most homeowners never anticipate. The Green Belt covers significant parts of the borough. And with 72 conservation areas — from Twickenham to Ham, Richmond Hill to Barnes — the chances that your property sits within or adjacent to one are higher than almost anywhere else in London.

Most homeowners don't realise that being near a conservation area can matter just as much as being inside one. And that's before you consider whether your property is listed, sits in a flood zone, or falls within one of the borough's Article 4 direction areas.

Article 4 directions change the rules on your street

Article 4 directions are one of the most misunderstood planning constraints in Richmond. They can remove permitted development rights that homeowners elsewhere in England assume are automatic — meaning work you'd normally do without any permission at all suddenly requires a full application in Richmond.

The problem is that Article 4 directions operate at a very local level. They can apply to specific streets or even individual properties. Whether one affects your home isn't something you can easily infer from your postcode or even your road name. It depends on your property.

What actually determines whether your application gets approved?

This is where it gets genuinely complicated. Your approval odds aren't just shaped by the rules in the Local Plan — they're shaped by what's actually been approved and refused for similar projects nearby. A rear extension that sailed through on one street might have been refused three doors down, for reasons that only become clear when you look at the decision notices.

Most homeowners go into applications without knowing how similar projects on their street have been decided. They don't know whether their specific combination of constraints — conservation area plus Article 4 plus proximity to a listed building, for example — has historically produced approvals or refusals. That gap between what you think will happen and what the data actually shows is where applications fail.

WhatCanIBuild is the best way to understand what that combination means for your specific address — not just the constraints that apply, but what's actually been approved and refused nearby, and what your real odds look like for your project type.

If you're planning anything in Richmond upon Thames — extension, loft conversion, outbuilding, change of use — the best way to know where you actually stand is to check your address before you commit to anything.

WhatCanIBuild shows you the approval history around your property, the constraints that apply specifically to your address, and what they mean for the project you're planning.