Community Council

of the Royal Burgh of Peebles & District

Community Council

of the Royal Burgh of Peebles & District

SBC Planning and Building

Scottish Borders Council's Planning and Building website is the online entry point for planning in the Borders.

Use it to: find out about planning applications; lodge objections; lodge your own applications; find SBC policies; or read SBC's Scheme of Delegation.

Most planning decisions are taking by planning officers, however some decisions are taken by SBC's Planning and Building Services Committee.

Commenting on planning applications

The first thing to read is SBC's guide for commenting on an application.

This tells you:

What a material planning consideration is

I.e. what planners take note of (and what they ignore)

How to make a comment on the planning portal
The postal address if you'd prefer to post your comment

SBC's planning portal

Use SBC's portal to find out about and comment^† on applications.

^† You'll need to register first to comment (registration guide).

SBC's guide for viewing an application with the portal.

Application reference numbers beginning with "ECU" (e.g. windfarms) are available via Scottish Government's Energy Consents Unit.

Applications beginning "yyFGS" (Forestry Grant Scheme, yy=2-digit year) or "FPA" (Felling Permission Application) are available on the Scottish Forestry Public Register (help)

Impactful comments

Planners are interested in how proposals affect you, your family and your community. They want to know your reasoning – be succinct. Ideally:

Mention one or more planning policies you think are relevant
Say clearly why you think these are relevant
Explain the 'so what' – e.g. if you think an application breaches a policy, why does this matter?

Planning policies

Policies relevant to the Borders are:

Scotland's National Planning Framework 4 (NPF4) contains 33 policies (part 2) in 3 groups.
SBC's Local Development Plan 2 (LDP2) contains 59 policies in Volume 1 and settlement profiles in Volume 2
SBC's approved planning guidance (referred to in the LDP).

SBC explain this in full in their plans and guidance overview.

Place planning

SBC's guidance on Local Place Plans (LPP) and Borders Community Action's Community Led Planning.

A link to SBC's register of local place plans will be added when available. For examples, see Dumfries and Galloway and The Highland Council registers of LPPs.