The yellow notice appeared on the pier or the gate, and the questions arrive together: what are they building, how bad is it for us, and what can we actually do? The steadying answer: plenty — if the first week is used properly, because the five-week clock started when the application was lodged, not when you spotted the notice.
Week One: Read the File
The site notice carries the planning reference, and the reference unlocks everything: the authority’s online planning register holds the full application — drawings, site layout, reports, the lodgement date your clock runs from — and reading it converts anxiety into information: the extension that looked enormous on the notice may be modest in section; the “dwelling” may be two. Read the drawings against your own property specifically — which windows face which of yours, where the ridge line sits against your light, where the entrance meets the road — and photograph the existing position now, because the before-picture is evidence only while it’s still “before.” Then diary the date: five weeks from lodgement for submissions, per the full objection guide.
The Decision of the Week: Submit, Talk, or Both
Three honest options, usually best combined: the conversation — neighbours often haven’t considered your gable at all, and design tweaks cost nothing at drawing stage; the neighbour-dispute page maps how to have it without starting a war. The submission — whatever the conversation yields, the five-week window doesn’t wait for it, and the submission does two jobs the conversation can’t: it puts your concerns formally on the file the decision-maker must consider, and it preserves your right to appeal whatever gets decided — the third-party appeal belongs only to those who made a valid submission. Both is the professional pattern: negotiate as if agreement is likely, submit as if it isn’t. What the submission should contain — the grounds that count and the ones that sink — is its own craft, covered in the grounds guide.
The mistake that costs most: “we’ll wait and see what the council does — sure we can always object later.” There is no later: no submission means no appeal right, and four weeks after a grant, the neighbour who waited holds nothing. The submission is the ticket; five weeks is the window; the register shows the date.
Site notice up, clock running? 01 5827148 — the file gets read and the grounds get drafted inside the window.