Methodology

The UK Planning Pipeline Tracker aggregates residential planning application data from UK local planning authority (LPA) public registers, rolled up to town, county and national level. Here's how the figures are built and what they do (and don't) tell you.

Data sources

• LPA planning registers — retrieved via Portal360 and equivalent Idox-based public-access systems, typically covering the past 12–24 months of residential applications.
• HM Land Registry Price Paid Data — for local median prices by property type (detached / semi / terrace / flat), used to derive estimated GDV.
• ONS Local Authority Boundaries — for linking LPA decisions back to county and town geography.

Inclusion criteria

Applications are included if they meet all of:

• Residential use class (C3) primary or material — single-dwelling applications and purely commercial schemes are excluded
• 5 or more units, or estimated GDV over £500,000 (to filter householder extensions and single-unit builds)
• Decision within the last 24 months, or currently pending

GDV estimation

GDV is estimated as: units × local median price by property type. Where the application doesn't specify a unit mix, we apply the ward-level average mix (from the most recent full-year Land Registry). This is deliberately simple and transparent — it will understate GDV on premium schemes and overstate it on affordable-heavy schemes. Treat the figure as directional, not appraisal-grade.

Approval rate

Approval rate is calculated as: approved ÷ (approved + refused). Pending applications are excluded from the denominator, and withdrawn applications are excluded entirely. Different LPAs publish decisions with different granularity; we treat an application as approved if any part of its decision text contains "approved", "permitted", or "granted".

Update cadence

National and county rollups refresh weekly from the underlying LPA feeds. Individual town pages inherit that cadence. Large applications (>500 units) are reviewed manually when flagged.

What this is not

This tracker is not a substitute for an LPA register search, a site-specific feasibility study, or a valuer's GDV. It's a fast overview for developers, investors and brokers needing to sense-check a region's pipeline before a deeper look.

For a scheme-specific development finance conversation, most UK developers work with a broker with a live lender panel — for example Construction Capital.