Multiple Units

Where a proposal includes two or more retail units that are combined to form a single shop care should be taken in providing some form of visual link. The use of a continuous fascia across two or more frontages can destroy the rhythm of the street scene and therefore will not normally receive sympathetic consideration by the Local Planning Authority.

With a few exceptions shop units have frontages of between 5 and 7 metres in width and this unit size will normally relate to the upper part of the building. This relationship is also the key to the scale and character of the area and should be maintained if at all possible.

Where two or more frontages form a business unit a visual link can be achieved by the use of colour and common detailing to the shopfronts whilst retaining the vertical emphasis between the shop units, thus retaining the unity created by the individual shop fronts. It is particularly important to retain matching shopfronts within the same building.