The county expects you to do it
Gloucestershire County Council is the highway authority for Cheltenham, and its Manual for Gloucestershire Streets (July 2020) sets the parking numbers for new homes. It leaves garages out of the count altogether, and says why. People can turn them into living space without permission, and many keep boxes in them instead of a car.
That tells you two things. On a house built to this standard, the parking the planners counted is on the drive, not behind the up-and-over door. For a three-bedroom house in urban Cheltenham the manual asks for two spaces, and three once there are four bedrooms. A space is at least 2.4 by 4.8 metres. Adding a fourth bedroom? Measure the drive first.
The manual does give a garage size, 6 by 3 metres inside, but only for garages meant to hold bikes and household storage. The borough's 2008 householder guide wants a new garage at least 2.7 metres wide inside so a car door can open on one side. Plenty of older ones fall short. If yours won't take a modern car, you lose little by converting it.
Back lanes, mews and streets with no drives
Plenty of older Cheltenham has no garage to convert. The 2003 character statement for the Poets estate in St Mark's says no parking was provided when the houses were built, and many front boundaries have since been opened up for cars.
In Leckhampton the conservation appraisal says the historic houses don't accommodate the modern car, so people park in the street. The garages that do exist sit on service lanes between the terraces, such as Brooksdale Lane, Croft Lane and Langdon Road Lane. The Park character area has small mews houses and garages built straight onto the footpath. Both areas are in the Central Conservation Area.
Integral and attached garages are more likely on later housing. The council's 2011 survey of private homes found that in the outer parts of the borough 42.4% were built between 1965 and 1981 and another 25.9% after 1981. If your garage is part of the house, the house is probably one of those.
Picking a use for the space
Integral. Found on the post-1965 estates. Before anyone draws, ask the council for the original decision notice for your house, because the Planning Portal warns that some permissions removed the right to convert.
Single. Most of the work is at the door end. Building control will want to see what the new wall stands on once the old opening is dug out.
Read our full guide: Single Garage Conversion: What Is Involved and What to Budget For →
Detached. Typical of the lane and mews garages above. The Planning Portal says a garage kept as a home workshop usually needs no planning permission, while one turned into self-contained living space is a change of use that does.
Home office. A converted lane garage puts the work out of the house altogether, which suits anyone on long calls. Run power and data out to it before the walls are lined.
Bedroom. It must work as a habitable room, with a way out in a fire if it is reached through another room. Near the River Chelt, check the flood map before putting a bed downstairs.
Utility or playroom. Convert the back half and keep a store behind the door, and the front stays as it was. That's the easy route in a conservation area.
Double. More likely beside a detached house. Convert one bay and keep the other, and the parking question mostly goes away.
Gym or studio. Where the garage shares a wall with the house next door, that wall needs sound insulation, and a drum kit needs more than the minimum.
Planning and building control. Inside work normally needs no planning application. Building Regulations approval is needed once the garage becomes living space, wherever you live.
Cost and value. No prices here. A lane garage with no services and a warm integral one on a 1980s estate are different jobs, so get three firms to look.
The new front wall and who signs it off
Swapping a garage door for a wall and window is an outside alteration. On an ordinary house the national householder rules usually cover it, provided the materials look like the rest of the house. Inside the seven conservation areas, or in the part of the borough within the Cotswolds National Landscape, the same rules exclude cladding the outside in render, stone, artificial stone, pebble dash, timber, plastic or tiles. If the house is rendered and you planned to render the infill to match, talk to the planners first or apply for a lawful development certificate. Cheltenham's single Article 4 direction deals with shared houses in St Paul's and has nothing to say about garage doors.
Building control here is Cheltenham and Tewkesbury Building Control, run by the borough for both councils, though your builder can use a private inspector. Either way, expect the same checks. The Planning Portal says the infill wall may need its own foundation, and the floor needs a damp proof membrane and insulation, sometimes raised to meet the hall. LABC adds that the membrane should lap the damp course in the walls. Much of the town sits on Lias clay, so let the surveyor see the ground under the door.
Radon protection can be needed in conversions where levels run high. Check your address on the UKradon map, and ask building control if you are unsure.
Where these facts come from
- Gloucestershire County Council: Manual for Gloucestershire Streets
- Cheltenham Borough Council: Residential Alterations and Extensions SPD (2008)
- Cheltenham Borough Council: Poets conservation area character statement (2003)
- Cheltenham Borough Council: Leckhampton character appraisal (2008)
- Cheltenham Borough Council: The Park character appraisal (2008)
- Cheltenham Borough Council: private sector house condition survey (2011)
- Town and Country Planning (General Permitted Development) (England) Order 2015, Schedule 2
- Planning Portal: garage conversion, planning permission
- Planning Portal: garage conversion, building regulations
- Planning Portal: converting a garage into a workshop
- Planning Portal: converting a detached garage into self-contained living space
- LABC: garage conversion tips from building control
- LABC: radon and building work
- Cheltenham Borough Council: building control
How FirQuote works in Cheltenham: We connect you with local specialists who visit your property before giving you a price. You get up to 3 written quotes — no call centres, no estimates from photos, no obligation to accept any quote.
Questions people in Cheltenham ask
Our garage is on the lane behind the house in Leckhampton. Can we make it a studio?
As a workshop or office used by the household, the Planning Portal says permission is typically not needed. If someone would live in it separately, that is a change of use and needs an application. Leckhampton is in the Central Conservation Area, so outside changes to the building also face tighter rules.
Will Gloucestershire Highways object if we lose the garage?
The county's street manual already leaves garages out of parking counts because they can be converted without permission, so the spaces it counts are the ones on the drive. Keep the drive usable. Then check the original planning permission for your house, because a condition on it can still take away the right to convert.
Our house is a 1970s detached on the edge of Charlton Kings. Does the National Landscape change anything?
It can. If the house falls inside the Cotswolds National Landscape, the householder rules don't allow the new front wall to be clad in render, timber, stone or tiles without permission. Check the boundary for your address first.
We live in a Poets estate semi. Is there anything to convert?
Probably not a garage. The estate was built without parking. If you want off-street space, the council's line is that front boundaries shouldn't be lost entirely.