Self Storage Planning Appeals UK: What Inspectors Decided

As at 17 October 2026 we read 21 decisions on self storage planning appeals in England, decided from 5 May 2022 to 5 October 2026: 13 were allowed and 8 dismissed. Character and appearance was a named main issue in 12 of the 21 (our count). We found the 21 by name, so they are a sample, not a census and not a success rate, and the Planning Inspectorate’s database cannot filter to self storage.

This guide is general information, not legal advice, and not planning advice. The appeals are those decided by the Planning Inspectorate in England. Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland have their own appeal bodies, and we read one information page of each, two for Northern Ireland, and no decisions. Ask a planning adviser about any real site.

How many self storage planning appeals are there, and where can you read them?

On 17 October 2026 we found no count of self storage planning appeals on the Planning Inspectorate’s database, statistics and appeals pages, no field naming the use in its Casework Database and no search by use on its two appeal portals.

The Inspectorate describes the database as “Detailed information on a selection of the Planning Inspectorate’s casework decisions over a 5 year rolling period.” The workbook we downloaded, from a page last updated on 1 October 2026, holds 91,449 rows of casework decided from 1 September 2021 to 28 August 2026, in 44 columns and with 19 development types (our count).

The Inspectorate says it removed the free-text field in 2021: “In 2021 we removed the ‘Development or Allegation’ field in the Casework Database.” It gives the risk of disclosing sensitive personal data as the reason. On 17 October 2026 we found no column among the 44 that describes the proposal or its use.

So we found decisions by name. We looked at 127 case numbers, opened 115 decision letters and counted 21 as genuine self storage planning decisions. Of the 127, 18 came from two random draws from the database’s storage development types, described below, and 16 of those 18 had a letter.

The other candidates were 108 database rows whose appellant, agent or site address text matched a list of storage words, plus appeal 6009712, which is too new to be in the database and which we found through our guide to automated self storage. How many we missed is unknown: a scheme whose papers leave it out of those three fields cannot be found.

The Inspectorate’s page says agents’ names are missing from casework decided after 31 March 2022, so for recent decisions the search leans on the appellant and site address fields.

A decision counts only after we read the letter’s development line and the Inspector’s reasoning. We counted it if the proposal is, or is part of, a self storage facility (a building, a site of containers or an extension) and the appeal is a planning appeal. That includes an application under section 73 (permission without complying with a condition) and an appeal against a condition.

We left out advertisement, enforcement and lawful development appeals, signs, masts and other structures at a site, false name matches and two borderline decisions, both dismissed, that we did not count.

Of the 21, 18 have references starting 32 or 33 and sit on the Appeals Casework Portal. The other three (6003526, 6004001 and 6009712) have references starting 600 and appear only on the newer “Comment on a planning appeal” service, which labels itself beta. Every one of the 21 letters is linked under Sources.

On 17 October 2026 the old portal answered “No case found” for 6009712 and the database held no row for it, so a scheme decided in 2026 may be missing from a search of the old portal (our inference).

The portal’s terms, last updated on 17 March 2021, say its information can be reproduced under the Open Government Licence v3.0, with some information excluded, and treat maps, plans and drawings separately. This guide quotes short passages and reproduces no plan or drawing.

Decisions before 1 September 2021 cannot be found by name. The Inspectorate’s older file, for decisions made 5 to 10 years ago, has removed every field that could identify an appeal, among them the case number, appellant, agent and site address.

What did inspectors decide on self storage appeals between 2022 and 2026?

Of the 21 decisions we read, 13 were allowed and 8 dismissed, and none was a split decision, meaning partly allowed and partly dismissed (a count of letters found by name, not a rate).

By decision year, the allowed and dismissed counts were 1 and 0 in 2022, 3 and 4 in 2023, 4 and 0 in 2024, 1 and 3 in 2025, and 4 and 1 in 2026 to 5 October.

By kind of appeal, 14 were against a refusal of planning permission (7 allowed, 7 dismissed), 5 were about a planning condition (4 allowed, 1 dismissed) and 2 were non-determination appeals, where the council did not decide in time (both allowed). An allowed appeal about a condition is not the same event as an allowed refusal.

One of the four allowed condition appeals, 6004001, was allowed only to correct typographical matters in a condition that the Inspector found reasonable and necessary.

By procedure, 15 were decided on written representations (7 allowed, 8 dismissed), 3 after a hearing and 3 after an inquiry. The six hearing and inquiry decisions were all allowed, so six letters cannot show how hearings and inquiries compare in general.

The Inspectorate’s guide describes the three procedures: in written representations the Inspector decides on written material, a hearing is a structured discussion led by the Inspector, and an inquiry is the most formal.

Six of the 21 were in London boroughs and 15 elsewhere in England, and the header of every letter says an Inspector appointed by the Secretary of State made the decision. In the table, written means written representations and condition means an appeal about a planning condition.

Two of the 21 are the least certain to be self storage. In 3337556 (Lydney) the Inspector describes storage containers offered to the public as storage space on land used temporarily for open storage, and a condition restricts the use to self storage. In 3353451 (Wrecclesham) the proposal is a part-retrospective change of use of land for storage containers for personal storage.

Another of the 21, 3318344 (Tower Hamlets), is a mixed scheme: a self storage building with flexible workspace beside two blocks of homes, commercial units and a nightclub and studio venue. Its main issue was the nightclub’s effect on the living conditions of the scheme’s future residents, not the self storage building, so it sits in the living conditions count although those residents are not neighbours.

The header of 15 letters repeats the application description and names Class B8 for the proposal, and 17 letters name B8 somewhere. Four letters never use the term (3304183, 3311678, 3353451 and 3357841), and each of those four is about storage containers on a site, which our guide to planning permission for storage containers covers. A count of words cannot show how the law classes self storage, and our entry on Use Class B8 covers that question.

On 17 October 2026 we found no letter among the 21 that calls the self storage use “sui generis”. The words occur in one letter, 3318344, about a nightclub and studio venue, a petrol filling station on the neighbouring site and a council policy on entertainment venues.

What did the inspectors name as the main issue?

Character and appearance was the most common main issue the Inspector named, in 12 of the 21 decisions we read (our count of each Inspector’s main-issue passage, not the Inspectorate’s classification).

Our rule has two steps. We found each letter’s main-issue passage (under a Main Issue heading in 17 letters, by the sentence that names the main issue in 4), matched it against fixed keyword lists, and then read all 21 passages, using the Inspector’s own words where a keyword and the passage disagreed.

The keyword rule gave 1 tag to 5 decisions, 2 to 8, 3 to 6, 4 to 1 and 5 to 1, so a decision can carry several and the counts add up to more than 21.

After our reading, character and appearance was a main issue in 12 decisions, location, development strategy or employment land in 6, neighbours’ living conditions and a planning condition in 5 each, highways, parking or access in 4, and none of our lists in 3. Heritage and trees or ecology were each in 2, and Green Belt, flood risk or drainage, fire safety and need or demand were each in 1.

A keyword rule alone would have given highways 6, a planning condition 9, need or demand 2 and none of the lists 1. The differences came from words such as “access” in fire-appliance access and “conditions” in living conditions, so those counts show the rule and not the Inspector.

Biodiversity net gain is in 8 of the 21 letters, and on 17 October 2026 we found no mention of it in the main-issue passage of any of the 21. Across each whole letter, not only the main issue, 9 mention a listed building, heritage asset or conservation area, 9 flood risk, 6 a planning obligation and 3 fire safety (our count).

The words “Class R” occur in one of the 21 letters, 3348145 (14 November 2025), in a sentence recording an understanding that prior approval had been granted for a change of use of an agricultural building to flexible uses. The words “permitted development” occur 12 times in 7 letters, 8 of them in the General Permitted Development Order named in the wording of conditions (our reading), and our Class R guide covers that route.

What have inspectors written about demand for self storage?

In 5 of the 21 letters the Inspector wrote about need, demand or under-provision of storage (our sentence rule, then our reading; two further keyword hits were false).

• 3304183, South Cambridgeshire District Council, Balsham, allowed on 6 September 2023: the Inspector records trade-body evidence pointing to “some unmet and growing demand for self-storage facilities in East Anglia”, finds it not conclusive that a countryside location is needed, and writes “I therefore afford this contention limited weight.”
• 3307268, Buckinghamshire Council, Little Horwood, dismissed on 8 June 2023: the Inspector acknowledges there may be increasing demand for secure storage, but writes “I attach little weight to the increased demand for such facilities” because the scheme was the relocation of a storage facility.
• 3348145, Bedford Borough Council, Ravensden, dismissed on 14 November 2025: the Inspector calls the need a report identifies “a general need” that “does not demonstrate a particular local need for the proposal”. The Inspector also writes “I have no doubt that there is some degree of local need for storage”, although it is “not quantified or linked to the scale of the proposal”.
• 3340475, London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham, London, allowed after an inquiry on 23 August 2024: “The need for self storage is not challenged by the Council”. The parties agreed that vacancy of “smaller sized units within the borough (less than 2,000sqft)” was around 1%, and the Inspector was satisfied there is “a shortage of space for this type of use across the borough”.
• 3320869, Trafford Metropolitan Borough Council, Altrincham, dismissed on 6 October 2023: the sentence our rule found includes the words “where the appellant states that there is an under-provision” of self storage in the area, and the Inspector weighed the economic benefits and the range of unit sizes offered as modest, not enough to outweigh the flood risk harm.

Five letters, each on its own site and evidence, cannot show how Inspectors treat demand in general.

What happened to appeals about opening hours and other conditions?

Five of the 21 decisions we read were appeals about a planning condition: four were allowed and one dismissed. Their reasons are below, in the Inspectors’ own words, in date order.

• 3304237, London Borough of Lambeth, London, dismissed on 10 July 2023: a section 73 appeal about an existing self storage and office building, where condition 2 limited opening hours and the Inspector treated the issue as its removal and 24-hour use. The Inspector wrote “Overall, condition 2 is necessary and reasonable.” and “Overall, the private benefit to the business would not outweigh the harm.”
• 3333432, Knowsley Metropolitan Borough Council, Huyton, allowed on 9 May 2024: an appeal against a condition limiting the permission for a site of storage containers, already operating, to 5 years. The council had said it would accept 10 years, which the Inspector adopted: “an extended temporary use for 10 years would be reasonable and necessary in order to protect the employment requirements of the area”.
• 6003526, Adur District Council, Shoreham-by-Sea, allowed on 8 April 2026: a section 73 appeal against a condition that made the permission temporary until 9 September 2030. The Inspector found that “The evidence before me does not demonstrate that the condition is reasonable or necessary to avoid prejudicing future opportunities for redevelopment of the appeal site” and granted permission without it.
• 6004001, Leicester City Council, Leicester, allowed on 19 June 2026: an appeal against a condition that required sample panels of the facade before construction. The Inspector found the condition reasonable and necessary, and allowed the appeal “in order that the typographical matters raised can be corrected”.
• 6009712, Royal Borough of Greenwich, Eltham, allowed on 5 October 2026: a section 73 appeal about condition 14, which set the hours the storage floorspace could open to the public. The Inspector noted that “Environmental Health officers have not objected to the proposed opening hours” and allowed opening from 07:00 rather than 08:00 on Monday to Saturday, closing at 21:00 as before.

We draw no rule from five letters on five sites. Our guide to automated self storage takes up planning conditions on opening hours for unstaffed sites, with the Greenwich decision as its example.

How long does a planning appeal take in England?

For section 78 planning appeals of every kind of development decided in June 2026, the Planning Inspectorate’s median time from the valid date to the decision was 17 weeks by written representations (758 decisions), 19 by hearing (52) and 27 by inquiry (15, a number the Inspectorate flags as fewer than twenty).

The Inspectorate’s statistics define the valid date as when a case is deemed validly received and the start date as when a timetable is issued. In the Inspectorate’s words, the largest volume of its casework is “appeals against refusal of Planning Permission, which are made under Section 78 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990”.

The Inspectorate’s page on how long appeals take, last updated on 30 July 2026, says the times “should not be relied on to give a reliable indication of what will happen to a case submitted recently or in the future”.

Its statistical release of 30 July 2026 gives the same medians to one decimal (17.1, 18.6 and 26.9 weeks) and a median of 19 weeks across all cases in the 12 months to June 2026. The next release is announced for 22 October 2026 (provisional), so these figures may move.

For the 1,055 planning appeals in the database’s general industry, storage, warehousing types (not self storage), the median for decisions from 1 September 2021 to 28 August 2026 was 27.3 weeks from the valid date to the decision and 19.4 weeks from the start date (our calculation).

That pools almost five years of decisions, whereas the Inspectorate’s June 2026 figures above are for one month. Across all 50,018 planning appeals in the database over the same period the median from the valid date was 26.9 weeks.

The two clocks start on different dates, and the gap between them has shortened. Across all planning appeals in the database the median gap from the valid date to the start date was 10.7 weeks for decisions made from 1 September to 31 December 2021 and 0.9 weeks for decisions made from 1 January to 28 August 2026 (our calculation). The Inspectorate’s own measure runs from the valid date.

Does a hearing or an inquiry change the outcome?

As at 17 October 2026 nothing we read shows whether a hearing or an inquiry changes the outcome, because the Inspectorate, not the appellant, chooses the procedure.

In the database’s general industry, storage, warehousing types (not self storage), the share allowed was 36.0% for written representations (948 appeals), 55.7% for hearings (63) and 62.8% for inquiries (44), our calculation of allowed over allowed, dismissed and split. Across all 50,018 planning appeals of any development type the order was the same: 27.7% for written representations (46,517), 47.9% for hearings (2,445) and 64.9% for inquiries (1,053).

The Inspectorate’s release of 30 July 2026 shows the same order for section 78 appeals of every kind in April to June 2026: an allowed rate of 29% for written representations, 53% for hearings and 57% for inquiries.

The Inspectorate’s guide says it decides the procedure after considering the views of the appellant and the council. That larger or more contested schemes are the ones sent to hearings and inquiries is our inference, so a higher share allowed is not shown to be caused by the procedure. In the 21 decisions we read, the 3 hearings and 3 inquiries were allowed, and six letters cannot show more than that.

How does an appeal work, who decides and by when must you appeal?

The Planning Inspectorate’s guide says that in England only the person who made the planning application can appeal, and that for most appeals the limit is 6 months from the date on the decision notice or from the end of the council’s decision period. GOV.UK adds that an appeal can be made on someone else’s behalf.

The Inspectorate’s guide lists the routes: a refusal, a grant with conditions the applicant objects to, or the council’s failure to decide in time. It sets shorter limits of 12 weeks for a householder or minor commercial refusal, 8 weeks for an advertisement consent appeal and 28 days where an enforcement notice has been served on the same or very similar development.

The guide defines minor commercial development as work on an existing building used as a shop, a financial or professional service, a restaurant or cafe, a drinking establishment or a hot food takeaway. It must be wholly at ground-floor level, with no change of use or number of units and no increase in gross internal area.

The guide says the Inspectorate does not accept an appeal received after the limit, and our guide to grant rates and timescales sets out the clocks for applications and appeals.

GOV.UK says: “There’s no fee for appealing.” The Inspectorate’s guide says an appellant who does not own the whole appeal site must notify each owner of any part of it, and the agricultural occupiers the guide names, before appealing.

There are three procedures: written representations, hearings and inquiries. The guide says the Planning Inspectorate, not the appellant or the council, decides which one an appeal follows, after considering their views, and that either can ask a senior officer to review the choice.

The procedure changed for applications submitted on or after 1 April 2026. The Inspectorate’s guide for those applications puts appeals against a refusal, against conditions and against a refusal to vary a condition on the “part 1” (expedited) written representations route, and says the Inspectorate may decide that an appeal follows a different procedure.

On that route the appellant cannot add new evidence the council has not seen, except after a material change of circumstance, interested people cannot comment at the appeal stage, and the council sends its papers within 5 working days of the start date. Non-determination appeals follow part 2.

For applications dated on or before 31 March 2026, the other guide puts appeals that are not householder or minor commercial ones, appeals against conditions and non-determination appeals on part 2, so a refused storage scheme falls there (our reading). The council sends its papers within one week of the start date, interested people send representations within 5 weeks and the parties send final comments within 7 weeks, with no new evidence.

As at 17 October 2026 none of the 21 decisions can be shown to have followed part 1: the five decisions of 2026 carry application references of 2025 or 2024, and the new guide applies only to applications submitted on or after 1 April 2026 (our inference from the reference years, which are not application dates).

The guide says each party normally meets its own costs, and that a party who behaves unreasonably and so causes another party wasted expense can be ordered to pay it. In 3307268 (8 June 2023) an application for costs against the council was refused.

For almost all appeals the power to decide has been transferred to an Inspector, and in a very small number the Secretary of State recovers the appeal. Decisions are published online.

The Inspectorate’s guide says a decision can be challenged in the High Court, with permission sought within 6 weeks beginning with the day after the decision. If the challenge succeeds the appeal returns to the Inspectorate for re-determination, usually by a different Inspector. In 3348145 (14 November 2025) the Inspector re-decided the appeal after the High Court quashed an earlier decision.

What do the Planning Inspectorate’s own figures cover, and what do they not?

As at 17 October 2026 the Casework Database covers a selection of the Inspectorate’s decided cases in England and has no field for the use, so its storage figures describe the Inspectorate’s general industry, storage, warehousing development types, which are not self storage.

The database page says casework in progress, withdrawn or turned away is left out, and that its counts may not match the Inspectorate’s other statistics. It adds that no targets are set for the share allowed and dismissed, that patterns of outcome can come from how work is allocated, and that some appeals are linked to one another. Some rows are linked appeals, so a count of rows is not a count of separate schemes.

The two storage values are Major general industry/storage/warehousing and Minor general industry/storage/warehousing, and the data notes say “Some categorisation of appeals can be subjective.”

Our tests show that these types are not a filter for self storage. Only 9 of the 20 counted decisions that are in the database carry one of the two storage types. The other 11 carry Change of use (6), Other minor developments (2), Other Major Developments (2) or Unknown (1).

We drew 18 of the 1,055 storage-typed appeals at random, in two draws with seeds 20261017 (drawn on 17 October 2026) and 20261016 (drawn on 16 October 2026), and 16 of them had a letter on the portal. On 17 October 2026 we found no self storage letter among the 16 we opened: they were agricultural buildings, outbuildings, a solar farm, workshops and similar. Sixteen is too few to give any share.

A name search of all 50,018 planning appeals for the words “self stor” in the appellant, agent or site address fields finds 29 rows, and only 7 carry a storage type. The 9 counted decisions that carry a storage type are 0.9% of the 1,055, a lower bound for the share of those appeals that are self storage and not an estimate of it.

For the 1,055 appeals in the general industry, storage, warehousing types (not self storage) the share allowed was 38.2%, against 29.4% for all 50,018 planning appeals. Share allowed is allowed divided by allowed plus dismissed plus split (our calculation). The Inspectorate’s own published allowed rate for section 78 planning appeals of every kind was 31% for April to June 2026.

The first and last years are partial: 2021 runs from 1 September and 2026 to 28 August. On 17 October 2026 we found no statement of when the database will next be updated.

What does this guide not cover?

On 17 October 2026 these were outside what we read, and we say so instead of guessing.

• Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. Each has its own appeal body, time limit and search form. We read one information page of each, two for Northern Ireland, and no decisions: on 17 October 2026 we found no list of decisions by use on the three decision-search pages, which are search forms that we did not submit.
• Wales. The Welsh Government’s page, last updated on 11 July 2025, says Planning and Environment Decisions Wales decides appeals, that there is no fee, and that the limit is 6 months from the date on the council’s decision notice.
• Scotland. The mygov.scot page, last updated on 17 June 2026, says the Planning and Environmental Appeals Division decides most appeals and that the limit is 3 months from the decision date. Our Scotland guide covers Scotland’s planning rules.
• Northern Ireland. The Planning Appeals Commission’s page is a news item dated 3 April 2015. It says most appeals must be submitted within four months of receiving the decision, for applications decided on or after 1 April 2015. The Commission’s Appeals Guide gives four months for planning appeals too, from the date of notification of the decision.
• Decisions before 1 September 2021. They cannot be found by name, as set out above.
• Decisions the name search missed. How many there are is unknown, as set out above.
• Conversions. They sit in the database’s separate Change of use type, so no figure in this guide describes a conversion, and our converting guide covers them.
• Enforcement, advertisement and lawful development appeals. The same name search found 13 enforcement-related case numbers, 18 advertisement appeals and 1 lawful development certificate appeal. They are a different regime, and we counted them apart.
• The timings of the new part 1 route. The database holds only 3 planning appeals with the procedure value Written representation (Part 1), so it cannot yet show how long the route takes.
• The law of planning itself. We did not capture the Town and Country Planning (Development Management Procedure) (England) Order 2015, section 78 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 or the National Planning Policy Framework. We report only how three 2026 letters cite the Framework: two by paragraph number and the newest, 6009712, by a policy code. Our site selection guide covers the Framework change.

Questions to put to your planning adviser

A planning consultant, the council’s planning officer or a solicitor can answer these for a real site. They are questions to ask, not advice.

• Which time limit applies to this decision, and from which date does it run?
• Does the date of the application place the appeal on the part 1 or the part 2 route, and which procedure does the Inspectorate propose?
• Which of the council’s reasons for refusal would the Inspector treat as the main issue, and what evidence answers each one on this site?
• If the case relies on need or demand, is the evidence tied to this site and its area, or is it a general need?
• Would an appeal against a condition, a new application or an application under section 73 fit this case better?
• In what circumstances could the Inspectorate award costs against the appellant, and what would adviser fees add?
• Does any legal point call for a solicitor, such as a challenge in the High Court within 6 weeks?

Sources

All read on 17 October 2026. Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.

• Casework Database: the Planning Inspectorate Casework Database (published 21 March 2018, last updated 1 October 2026, data to 28 August 2026) and the Inspectorate’s Appeals Data: Data notes and guidance (updated 1 October 2026).
• Procedural guides: the Planning Inspectorate’s Planning appeals: procedural guide, for appeals relating to applications dated on or after 1 April 2026 (published 12 February 2026, updated 14 October 2026) and its guide for applications dated on or before 31 March 2026 (published 6 April 2015, updated 16 July 2026).
• Timescales and statistics: the Planning Inspectorate’s Appeals: how long they take (updated 30 July 2026), its statistical release of 30 July 2026 and the announcement of the release due on 22 October 2026 (updated 4 March 2026).
• GOV.UK guides: Appeal against a planning decision, with its pages on the time limit, making an appeal and challenging a decision in the High Court (first published 8 September 2015); Claim planning appeal costs (updated 24 January 2025); and the planning practice guidance on Appeals (last updated 2 April 2026).
• Decision letters on the Appeals Casework Portal, decided 5 May 2022 to 2 March 2026: 3275294, 3307268, 3311678, 3304237, 3318344, 3304183, 3320869, 3324830, 3333432, 3337347, 3337556, 3340475, 3353451, 3352551, 3357841, 3348145, 3375194 and 3375644.
• Decision letters on the Comment on a planning appeal service, decided 8 April to 5 October 2026: 6003526, 6004001 and 6009712.
• The portals: the Planning Inspectorate’s Appeals Casework Portal with its terms and conditions (last updated 17 March 2021), and the Comment on a planning appeal service (beta).
• Other nations: the Welsh Government’s Appeal a planning decision (last updated 11 July 2025) and its planning casework search; the Scottish Government’s Appealing a planning decision on mygov.scot (last updated 17 June 2026) and the Planning and Environmental Appeals Division’s case search. Northern Ireland: the Planning Appeals Commission’s Time Limit for Appeals (dated 3 April 2015), Appeals Guide and appeal search.