The Borough Council's adopted Supplementary Planning Guidance on Backland & Tandem Development states that the access drive serving a backland site should be a minimum of 3 metres from any side or front elevation windows to ancillary rooms such as a hallway or bathroom, and 5 metres from any side or front elevation windows to habitable rooms such as kitchens and lounges. The access drive runs parallel with the side elevation of 44 Cossington Road, which has a dining room window and a utility room window at ground floor level and a further dining room and kitchen windows in the front and rear elevations significantly less than 5 metres from the edge of the proposed driveway. The local planning authority is of the opinion that the erection of two dwellings to be served by this access would result in the passage of vehicles and pedestrians within very close proximity to these windows and would result in noise and disturbance to the detriment of the living conditions of the occupiers of this dwelling. As such, the proposal is contrary to the adopted Supplementary Planning Guidance on Backland and Tandem Development and saved Policy H/16 of the Adopted Borough of Charnwood Local Plan.

It is the opinion of the local planning authority that, by reason of scale, height and design, the proposed dwellings would be out of scale and character with the surrounding area that is characterised by modest two-storey dwellings properties and would appear as incongruous and over-dominant features in this locality at the transition between the settlement and the Soar Valley floodplain. The scheme would, therefore, be contrary to saved Policies H/16 and EV/1 of the adopted Borough of Charnwood Local Plan and the provisions of the Borough Council's adopted Supplementary Planning Document, Leading in Design (2006).