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Front gardens: To pave or not to pave?

Paving over your entire front garden can have a serious impact on the natural and urban environment.  Replacing your gardens with hard surfaces:

  • increases the chance of flooding
  • decreases the appearance of streets and houses 
  • increases water pollution
  • decreases bio diversity

Did you know? The London Assembly has found that almost a quarter of the front gardens in South-East England are now completely paved over: an area equal to 5,200 football pitches!

Planning permission now required

New planning legislation means that planning permission is now required to pave over your garden with more than 5 square meters of non-permeable surfaces.

Permission is not required if you use permeable surfaces.  These include:

  • grass
  • pavers and grass
  • loose gravel
  • pavers on a sand bed.

Using permeable surfacing and planting more vegetation prevents the flooding of your property and improves its appearance (and potential value).

More information

To find out more about the impacts and what you can do, see the Front Gardens Matter Brochure.  To find out if you need planning permission, visit the Planning and Environment page.

Redbridge’s '£ for £' Tree Planting Scheme

Trees improve and enhance the environment of Redbridge. The '£ for £' scheme allows you to get involved in the planting of new trees in your local area. Under the scheme, the Council will finance 50% of the cost of supplying and planting trees in Redbridge. An application for the scheme can be made for any location within the borough, on private or public land. For more information, visit the '£ for £' page.