This evening I submitted my first ever planning application to Bristol City Council. It was a listed building consent application for retrospective application for the removal of the Grade 2-listed statue of Edward Colston. THREAD 
It's a common misconception that you need to own the land you are applying for planning permission on. You don't. You just have to serve notice to the owners. In this case, it's Bristol City Council. I couldn't find an obvious generic email address so I sent it to complaints.
Bristol City Council requires you to fill in a form, and also provide three documents: a Design and Access Statement, a Location Plan and a Site Plan. The latter two you can imagine. Here's the D&AS I submitted. They just need to know you have considered design principles.
In the form, they ask me to describe what I am proposing to demolish (I made sure it was clear) and say why it was necessary (I gave my own brief account, others could definitely do better).
At one stage I was asked to describe how I have consulted with the community. I admit it's not the kind of deep consultation necessary for such an important issue, but I linked them to this Twitter poll:
I was surprised to find that it doesn't cost anything to submit the planning application (at least at first). The next step is for a planning officer to consider whether I have submitted a valid application.
If it is deemed that I have, then it could get interesting...
If it is deemed that I have, then it could get interesting...
I will update this thread when I hear back from the council. I hope it is clear that I am doing this on the off-chance that we can formalise the removal of the statue and ensure the council (via the planning authority) recognises that it cannot be reinstated to this location.
Apologies for some of the images being unclear, I don't know what happened there. You can read all the documentation if/when it appears on the public website...
Also, it's probably worth saying how usually a listed building consent is one of the hardest things to get permission on. I guess that conversions of stately homes are different to bronze statues that are already in harbours!
Interesting to note thr leader of Oxford City Council saying she has written to Oriel College to ask them to apply for planning permission to remove the statue of Cecil Rhodes... #RhodesMustFall
Just to clarify, as some have asked. The large base would remain in place if this planning application were validated and determined with an approval. It's simply formalising the removal of the statue and the block it was erected on.
The latest we're probably looking at is probably Wednesday next week for news on whether the application is deemed to be valid.
There has been some conjecture over the last few days over the ownership of the statue itself. As I understand it, that is not a concern for the planning application as it is the ownership of the land (not the construction on it) that is the key factor.
