Woking checks daylight on plan and on elevation
If your extension needs planning permission, the document that decides most Woking cases is the council's Outlook, Amenity, Privacy and Daylight guidance, adopted in February 2022. It flags any two-storey addition that runs more than 3 metres past the back of the house. Then comes the test. Take the middle of your neighbour's nearest window and draw a 45-degree line from it, once on the plan and once on the side elevation. If the centre of their window falls inside both lines, the council treats the loss of light as serious.
Two details matter. For patio doors and full-height glazing the point is taken 1.6 metres above the ground, not at the middle of the glass. Where the extension has a pitched roof, the line starts halfway up the slope. The same guidance admits that on a narrow semi or terrace there may be little room to extend this way, unless the two neighbours build together.
Then there's the garden. On a family house of two or more bedrooms the council expects the garden left behind to be no smaller than the footprint of the house, and on a large home over 150 square metres, bigger than its whole floor area. The same document says garden size must be in scale with the dwelling, extensions included. Big detached plots rarely struggle with that. Modest semis in Sheerwater or St Johns should measure first.
What suits a Woking house
Detached houses and semis make up most of the borough, so the options look different from a terraced town.
Single-storey rear. Outside the conservation areas the national rules allow 3 metres on a semi (4 on a detached) without an application, or 6 and 8 metres through the neighbour notification route. Go bigger, or build inside one of the 27 conservation areas, and the 45-degree test applies.
Wrap-around. Good on the wider plots at Hook Heath and Pyrford. The side part takes it out of permitted development wherever the house sits in a conservation area, so plan for an application.
Two storey. The council's long-standing guidance has been to keep a two-storey side extension clear of the boundary and to refuse side additions that join houses into a terrace. Ask the planners what gap they expect on your street.
Kitchen. Big sliding doors facing a neighbour count as a window under the privacy rules. Keep side glazing high or use rooflights, which the council accepts don't overlook if they sit 1.7 metres above the floor.
Open plan. Knocking the old back wall through means steel. Woking's own building control team inspects beams and columns before they're encased, so have the engineer's drawings ready before the builder starts.
Downstairs bedroom. A bedroom and shower room for a parent, joined to the house, is an ordinary extension. Make it fully independent and the council treats it as a new dwelling, which brings the heathland contribution.
Home office. A detached studio is allowed if it is plainly ancillary to the house. Attached, it avoids that argument and doesn't eat into the garden the council wants kept.
Side return. Only for the borough's smaller stock of Victorian and Edwardian terraces, such as the short rows in Brookwood. It sits beyond a side wall, so a conservation area means permission.
Planning. Check three things before paying for drawings. Is the house in a conservation area, listed or locally listed? Is it in the Green Belt? Is it near the Wey or the Hoe Stream? Each one changes the route.
Cost. We don't print prices. In Woking a flood risk assessment, steel and drawings revised to pass the daylight test are what usually move a quote.
Houses in the Green Belt
Most of the land around the town is Green Belt, and the council's Core Strategy notes a good deal of low density housing in it, as well as small villages such as Mayford and Brookwood just outside the built-up area. Here the question is how much the house has already grown. Policy DM13 measures it against the original building as it stood on 1 July 1948, or as first built if later. Council planning reports quote the acceptable range as 20 to 40 per cent above that original volume, judged case by case.
So dig out the planning history. A 1960s garage and a 1990s conservatory already count, and they may have used up most of the allowance before you start.
Byfleet, Mayford and the river edge
The council's flood risk study puts large parts of south and east Byfleet at high risk from the Wey, and the Hoe Stream floodplain at high risk too, including built-up land along the A320 and at Mayford. Ground water runs higher along the Wey through Old Woking, Kingfield and Westfield. If your house is in Flood Zone 2 or 3, a minor extension needs a flood risk assessment with the application, done to the Environment Agency's standing advice.
Further north and west the ground is sandy, which is easier to dig than clay but still needs inspecting. Woking's building control surveyors inspect the foundations before they are covered, and you must notify them within seven days of finishing.
Where these facts come from
- Woking: Outlook, Amenity, Privacy and Daylight SPD (2022)
- Woking: House Extensions SPG (2001)
- Woking: Development Management Policies DPD (2016)
- Woking planning committee report citing Policy DM13
- Woking planning committee report citing the Design SPD
- Woking Core Strategy: portrait of the borough
- Woking Strategic Flood Risk Assessment, Volume 1 (2015)
- GOV.UK: Flood risk assessment standing advice
- Thames Basin Heaths Avoidance Strategy SPD (January 2026)
- Woking building control: book a site inspection
- GOV.UK: Permitted development rights for householders, technical guidance
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Questions people in Woking ask
Our semi in Knaphill has a big glass door next door. Will that stop a two-storey extension?
It could. For patio doors Woking takes its 45-degree line from 1.6 metres above the ground. If the door's centre falls inside the line on both plan and elevation, expect the council to object.
We live near Pyrford in the Green Belt. The house was extended in the 1970s. Can we add more?
Perhaps, but the earlier work counts. The council measures against the house as it was in July 1948, and its reports put the acceptable band at 20 to 40 per cent above that original volume. Have the existing additions measured first.
Can we build a self-contained annexe for my mother at the bottom of the garden?
A garden building that is plainly ancillary to the house can be acceptable. A separate, independent home is treated like a new dwelling, and new homes pay towards protecting the Thames Basin Heaths. Keep shared kitchens or access if you want it handled as an extension.
We're in south Byfleet. Does the flood risk mean no extension?
No, but it means more paperwork. Check the flood zone for your address. In Zone 2 or 3 the application needs a flood risk assessment following the Environment Agency's advice for minor extensions.