Commenting on a planning application

The Mayor only sees planning applications that are of ‘potential strategic importance (PSI) to London. These are commonly known as ‘referred’ applications.

To find out more about what makes an application referable to the Mayor, click on the button below:

All applications that have been referred to the Mayor, are available on our PlanApps system.

Planapps allows you to both view historic cases referred to the Mayor as well as comment on current cases.

It depends on what stage the application is at. For most of the applications that the Mayor reviews, the Local Council, known as the Local Planning Authority, will be deciding on the application.

It’s important that you write to the Local Council in these instances. You are of course also welcome to make comment to the Mayor if the application is referable.

The below table outlines who is the Local Planning Authority for each application stage.

Your comment will only be made public for applications where the Mayor has directed that he will become the Local Planning Authority (also known as Stage 3 applications).

*The Local Planning Authority may have their own policies and processes around publishing comments.

Comments made may enter the public domain as a result of a FoI or Environmental information request, or any other legal requirement.

When you have commented on a Stage 1 or Stage 2 application, you will receive an acknowledgement email confirming your comment has been registered.

The comment will then be registered to the relevant planning application. The case officer for that case will then review the comment, assessing the material planning considerations that have been raised.

The case officer will include a summary of all comments made in the Stage 2 report. This will allow the Mayor or decision-maker to assess the comments made.

When you have commented on a Stage 1 or Stage 2 application, you will receive an acknowledgement email confirming your comment has been registered.

Your comment on a Stage 3 application will be published on PlanApps. You should not include any information that is sensitive within your comment that you do not wish to be published.

The comment will then be registered to the relevant planning application. The case officer for that case will then review the comment, assessing the material planning considerations that have been raised.

The case officer will include a summary of all comments made in the Stage 3 report. This will allow the Mayor or decision-maker to assess the comments made.

If you have made a comment on a Stage 3 application, and want your comment removed, you can do so by emailing [email protected]. You should confirm your name, email address and whether you would like your comment to be disregarded entirely or just unpublished.