There was considerable local support for the scheme from local councillors and the town’s MP, but following submission of the planning application, Nottinghamshire County Council initially raised a highway objection and requested further information regarding the development's traffic generation and parking implications.

The Highway Authority questioned the assumptions used within the original trip generation assessment and requested a robust worst-case assessment based on a greater proportion of face-to-face appointments. Concerns were also raised regarding staff parking, including the extent of land available to accommodate parking and the reduction in spaces resulting from the proposed extension.

A key challenge was therefore to demonstrate the genuine additional highway impact arising from the proposed development, rather than simply assessing all of the proposed consulting rooms as entirely new capacity.

Mayer Brown worked closely with the project team to prepare a detailed Transport Technical Note responding to the Highway Authority's concerns.

A key part of the response was establishing a realistic fall-back position. The team demonstrated that, if planning permission were not granted, the existing building could be internally reconfigured to provide six additional permanent consulting rooms within its existing footprint. While these rooms would not meet the same modern standards as the proposed accommodation, the reconfiguration could be undertaken without planning permission.

Consequently, the preferred development would effectively provide only two additional consulting rooms compared with the fall-back position. This enabled the transport impact of the scheme to be assessed on the genuine net increase in capacity.

We then undertook a revised worst-case assessment using the Highway Authority's requested assumptions, assuming the additional rooms had a higher proportion of face-to-face appointments. This demonstrated that the net additional development would generate up to five patient arrivals and five departures per hour, with additional patient parking demand of up to four spaces at any one time. Additional staff parking demand was limited to around two spaces at any one time.

The parking arrangements were also comprehensively reviewed. Revised plans demonstrated that the existing level of 12 staff parking spaces could be retained by formalising the parking layout, while discussions with a neighbouring public house identified the potential for up to 15 additional spaces to be made available to Health Centre staff. The adjacent public car parks and existing parking restrictions on surrounding streets provided further reassurance that the limited increase in parking demand would not create a highway safety issue.

Following consideration of this additional evidence, Nottinghamshire County Council concluded that the development would not result in a significant increase in vehicle movements and that any limited additional parking demand would be unlikely to create a highway safety concern. Crucially, the Highway Authority concluded that the proposals would not result in a severe impact on the public highway and formally withdrew its objection.

Planning permission was subsequently granted in August 2026, enabling the Health Centre to proceed with the modernised facilities required to accommodate future patient growth.