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Building & planning application records
The page relates to historic planning documents held at the City Archives. If you have a query about a current planning application please contact Planning Enquiries on 0114 203 9183.
The 1848 Health of Towns Act allowed boroughs to introduce building bye-laws and regulations for (mainly) sanitary purposes. Under these powers a plan would have to be submitted to the plans sub-committee of the borough for approval.
Sheffield adopted these powers by issuing the 1864 local building bye-laws. The plans were to be submitted to the Plans Sub-committee of the Highways Committee from Oct. 1864. Plans were to be submitted for all buildings built after that date.
Registers of building plans, 1864 onwards and planning applications/building plans 1864 onwards (with gaps).
Contact us on archives@sheffield.gov.uk for more information, to book appointments or order archival materials.
Location of records
Original plans from 1864, the registers and the committee minutes are available at Sheffield Archives, 52 Shoreham Street, Sheffield.
Order documents
Not all archive material is stored onsite and we may require notice of the items you wish to see. Please contact us to confirm when we can retrieve items for you.
Please also note that building plans from 2005 are not normally made available at Archives.
Copies
We can normally supply copies for private study purposes, subject to the usual copyright regulations. Please contact us for further information.
Format
The registers are large volumes; Pre-1925 building plans are mainly available on aperture cards (microfiche), later plans are available as paper files; Plans Sub-committee minutes are volumes.