This Week in Astor  //  Planning week 6 Jul–12 Jul 2026

1,287 new applications this week across 31 boroughs, and 42 more Article 4 directions added to our records

We've logged nearly 1,300 new planning applications this week, and added 42 more Article 4 directions to our records. Across the boroughs we cover, Leeds and Westminster continue to lead the volume; most of the directions we added cover Brent, where they have been in force for years.

In short

1,287 applications filed this week across 31 boroughs; 237 decisions delivered (198 approved). We added 42 Article 4 directions to our records, 39 of them in Brent (Neasden Village, Sudbury Court, Brondesbury, North Kilburn, Queen's Park among them) — long-standing restrictions, material for HMO and conversion investors there, but not newly made. Leeds and Westminster remain the busiest portals. We've shipped investor tab redesign, improved in-app assistant diagnostics, and one-click borrower onboarding.

Article 4 coverage deepened in Brent

42 Article 4 directions were added across our records this week, 39 of them in Brent — Neasden Village, Sudbury Court, Brondesbury, North Kilburn and Queen's Park among them. None was designated this week: they date from 1976 onwards, the most recent of the Brent set from 2021, and what changed is our coverage rather than the law. The restrictions are material all the same — they shift the cost and timeline of any residential conversion or subdivision in those areas, and matter to anyone holding stock or planning HMOs there. (Corrected 11 August 2026: this section originally described the 42 directions as a surge of new designations.)

Planning activity and notable schemes

237 decisions landed this week (198 approvals, 32 refusals). Leeds led new applications with 156, followed by Westminster at 139 and Barnet at 87. In our records: a 17-unit residential conversion at Matthew Murray House in Leeds (listed building, first-to-second-floor office-to-C4), a 10-bed HMO change of use in Hertsmere complete with extension, and a significant mixed-use redevelopment detail approval in Lambeth (Construction Waste Management Plan discharge for a 6–11 storey scheme).

What we shipped

This week we rebuilt the Investors tab with real search and browsable picker across fund relationships and flow-of-funds visibility. The in-app assistant now gates specificity properly — no false flags, genuine diagnosis only — and watches data freshness across your entire pipeline. You can seed a lender memo straight from a scheme by one click. Deal deduplication and one-click borrower onboarding are live, and the deal book is now paginated for faster browse at scale.

Past weeks