65 Poolemead Road, Whiteway, Bath

BPT strongly emphasises that the close, pedestrian proximity of family facilities such as Twerton Infants School make this an attractive, convenient, and appropriate property for families. A change of use to a HMO would not serve the local demand for housing in this area and would result in the loss of suitable family accommodation. Approval of this application would maintain an undesirable precedent and should therefore be resisted.

The need for a large rear extension to provide amenity space whilst doubling the number of proposed bedrooms is indicative of overcrowding with resulting harm to the amenity of future occupiers as well as being of possible detriment to neighbouring residents. We maintain that should the principle of HMO use be considered acceptable in this location, a smaller number of rooms should be proposed proportionate to the size of the dwelling.

We note that the floor plan labels the living & dining room as “Bedroom 24.3m2”. We presume this is a drawing error but note that the use of communal space as a seventh bedroom would be considered appropriate and result in a failure to provide adequate communal amenity space for future residents. An HMO of over 6 bedrooms would also need to apply for a change of use to “Sui generis” rather than C4.