We became involved in this project after our clients had already endured two years of mis-information and handling by the City Council. The matter revolved around the perceived noise impacts of the use of the site upon residents living up to 100m away. Initially tasked with assessing their options, we were able to objectively examine the merits of the application set against a background of two previous planning refusals and an unsuccessful appeal.
We were able to advise that in our opinion, having discussed and arranged new noise assessment support, provided that noise assessments could prove the use to be acceptable there would be no good reason in planning terms to refuse permission for the continued use of the site as a nightclub for up to 300 people.
Despite this the City Council maintained that the tests could not demonstrate that the use could meet their noise criteria. However, with the support of our acoustician, we were not only able to prove that the council’s required assessment criteria was unworkable in this instance and that the noise testing carried out proved beyond any doubt that the use of the site had no impacts upon residential amenity. The addition of a new ‘real-time’ noise recording and limiting device, imported from the club operator’s experience of working in New York City and displaying a log of the sound output of the in-house system online for all to see, provided the final assurance that the Council planners needed to make a pragmatic decision and grant planning permission. This approach has clearly improved the prospects of other entertainment operators in the city to address the somewhat archaic sound demands of the City Council, and in doing so provide them with an efficient and very effective method of monitoring and controlling sound output from venues across the Leeds and further afield.
