Daylight & Sunlight Assessments in Tower Hamlets

Tower Hamlets is the densest borough we work in, and the daylight questions here are different from the suburbs. A single extra storey on a Hackney Road or Bethnal Green Road shop-and-flats building, a rear extension to a Bow or Stepney terrace, or a new building on a school or estate site in Shadwell or Whitechapel will almost always sit within a few metres of someone's window, and that window may already be short of sky before anything is built. The council knows this, and it asks for daylight and sunlight evidence earlier and more often than most.

The other difference is the new homes themselves. Tower Hamlets expects roof-top and infill flats, which are usually single-aspect and overshadowed by their neighbours, to be tested for their own daylight and sunlight exposure under the 2022 BRE method, not just assessed for their effect on the street. A good share of our work in the borough is this internal testing.

Recent daylight and sunlight assessments in Tower Hamlets

324 Hackney Road, E2: upward extension for a new flat

One additional storey on a building on Hackney Road to create a three-bedroom flat, needing an internal daylight and sunlight report for the full planning application. We modelled the building and its surroundings and tested the new flat's habitable rooms for spatial daylight autonomy and sunlight exposure, then updated the model and re-tested when the drawings changed after the structural engineer's input. The final report was issued in February 2026. Application PA/26/00431/A1 was validated on 6 May 2026 and is currently with the council.

Richard Street, Shadwell, E1: new building at a secondary school

A new building for a secondary school off Commercial Road, assessed for its effect on the neighbouring homes at Hainton Close and on the school's own main building. Non-domestic schemes are tested the same way as houses when the neighbours are residential, so we ran VSC, NSL and APSH at every facing window, and the report was issued in mid-2026. The practice returned for another council-requested assessment. Wherever flats look onto a site, a school building needs a BRE report, and the testing is no different from a housing scheme.

What Tower Hamlets planning officers look for

Tower Hamlets determines applications against the Local Plan 2031, adopted in January 2020, and in particular Policy D.DH8 (Amenity), read with D.H3 (Housing standards and quality) and D.DH6 (Tall buildings and height). Together they require new homes to receive adequate daylight and sunlight and development to avoid unacceptable loss of light to neighbouring occupiers. Daylight and sunlight sits on the council's local validation list, so for major residential schemes, and for anything that could reduce light to neighbouring homes, the report is expected with the application rather than after a request.

The council asks for the assessment to follow BRE 209, Site layout planning for daylight and sunlight (2022 edition), and it wants more than a statement of compliance. Officers expect summary tables for daylight and for sunlight setting out how many rooms fall short of the BRE criteria and by how much, graded minor, moderate or major, and a view on whether the result is acceptable in a dense inner-London context. Our Tower Hamlets reports are formatted that way as standard, with the before-and-after figures for every window in an appendix so the case officer can check any individual result against the summary. The Local Plan is at towerhamlets.gov.uk/lgnl/planning_and_building_control/planning_policy_guidance/local_plan/local_plan.aspx.

When you need an assessment in Tower Hamlets

• Upward extensions and roof-top flats on the parades of Hackney Road, Bethnal Green Road, Roman Road and Commercial Road, where the new flat's own daylight is tested as well as the neighbours'
• Rear and side extensions to the terraces of Bow, Mile End and Stepney Green, particularly where the neighbour's rear room is already enclosed
• Infill and estate-regeneration blocks in Whitechapel, Shadwell, Poplar and the Isle of Dogs, which sit on the validation list as major development
• Non-residential buildings, including schools and community buildings, wherever flats face the site
• Class MA and office-to-residential conversions around Aldgate and Canary Wharf, where single-aspect units need a natural-light report
• Any scheme where an objection or a pre-application response has raised daylight

How we work

Send us the drawings and we build the 3D model of the scheme and the surrounding blocks ourselves, usually without a site visit. The fee is fixed and agreed in advance and a report normally takes 4–5 working days. The full service is described on our daylight and sunlight assessment page. For neighbours we run the four BRE tests:

• VSC for daylight at each facing window
• NSL for daylight distribution inside the rooms
• APSH for annual and winter sunlight to windows within 90 degrees of south
• Sun on ground for gardens and shared amenity space on 21 March

For new homes we test spatial daylight autonomy and sunlight exposure under the 2022 method. The tests are explained on our VSC, NSL and APSH page and the benchmarks on our BRE guidelines page.

Frequently asked questions in Tower Hamlets

Does a one-storey roof extension really need an internal daylight report?

In Tower Hamlets, usually yes. A new flat on top of an existing building is a new residential unit under Policy D.H3, and officers want to see that its rooms meet the BRE daylight and sunlight exposure targets, as at Hackney Road.

My neighbours' windows already get very little sky. Does that count against me?

Not automatically. BRE 209 compares the light before and after, so a window keeping 80% of a low VSC is within the guideline. Where a window falls below that, the council's own guidance recognises that dense inner-London sites are judged in context, and our report says plainly how much is lost and whether it is minor, moderate or major.

Will the council accept a report without the graded summary tables?

In our experience it will ask for them, which delays the application. We include the minor, moderate and major tables for daylight and sunlight in every Tower Hamlets report.

Get a fixed-fee quote

Send your drawings through our contact page or get an instant figure from the price calculator. Call Nick on 01962 809155 or email nick@sunlightassessments.co.uk; if your site is north of the canal, see our Hackney page.