Development Intent
AtlasCroydonOfficersHayley Crabb
Case officer · Croydon Planning

Hayley Crabb.

Active — last recorded decision May 2026

A case officer at Croydon with an approval rate of 73% across 482 decided planning applications, spanning 23 wards.[1] Decision speed and appeal performance publish when decision notices are ingested.

Planning officer482 decisions73% approvalSave
Croydon · ward map
Approval rate — by ward
Lower ~68%
Higher ~90%
ShowingAll years · subscriber →across all years on record — a period re-scopes the headline figures and the trend
At a glanceEach metric links to the investigation behind it
All investigations →
482
Applications
2020–26
Approval rate over time — tougher or softer 🔒Dashed line = London average
avg 81%71%202065%202171%202274%202379%202479%202568%2026
Approval-rate trend is subscriber dataSubscribe to see the trend →
What they decide — by application type
How they compareVersus peers
Approval rate73% · 36th of 83
higher is betterdashed = London avg
Decision time · publishes with decision notices
in development
Appeal overturn · publishes with decision notices
in development
How this officer decides — from their own reports184 officer reports parsed
5%
Approves despite concerns
of approvals record a documented reservation
2%
Negotiated approvals
approvals mentioning revisions/amendments
8%
"On balance" reports
reports using explicit balancing language
77%
Bespoke reasoning
of report text written for the case, not recited
What they write about — vs Croydon's average officer

Topic mentions per 1,000 words of their own report text (boilerplate stripped), indexed against all parsed Croydon reports. Attention, not stance.

Trees & landscape
1.65× borough avg
Precedent & consistency
1.47× borough avg
Flooding & drainage
1.38× borough avg
Character & heritage
1.2× borough avg
Transport & parking
1.19× borough avg

Mark = borough average (1×). Bar capped at 2×.

How they reason — coded from their reports

Crabb's reports are unusually thorough on planning-history cross-referencing, repeatedly pulling the exact separation distances and window arrangements GRANTED under a prior application on the same site before assessing whether the current scheme worsens or matches that baseline. She is one of the more policy-citation-dense officers, reciting the full Local Plan/London Plan policy list at the head of most reports, and treats a departure from a previously-approved separation distance as independently significant even where the absolute distance might otherwise read as acceptable.

Observable habits

· cross-references the exact separation distance or design feature GRANTED under a named prior application on the same site (e.g. 'Application number 18/02001/FUL was granted with an approximate distance of 5.5m') before assessing whether the current scheme departs from that baseline

· recites the full applicable Local Plan and London Plan policy list under a 'RELEVANT PLANNING POLICIES AND GUIDANCE' heading before the substantive assessment, rather than citing policies only as they arise

· treats obscure-glazing mitigation proposed for a single-aspect window serving a habitable room as insufficient where that window is the room's ONLY source of light, rather than accepting glazing conditions as a general fix

What their reports consistently look for

· the exact separation distance or design feature previously granted on the same site, used as the baseline the current scheme is tested against

· whether a proposed mitigation (e.g. obscure glazing) is being applied to a room's only source of light, which she treats as insufficient regardless of the glazing itself

· whether the full Local Plan/London Plan policy list relevant to the application has been stated up front rather than only cited where convenient

Assigned Hayley Crabb on a live case?What they pay attention to, how they reason, and what their reports consistently look for — so you can address it before they raise it.Subscribe to unlock →
In their own words

this window serves a studio flat (kitchen/bedroom area) which is the only window serving this room and therefore obscure glazing this window would have a negative impact on the amenities of this occupier

20/00567/FUL

Application number 18/02001/FUL was granted with an approximate distance of 5.5m), thus the first floor is now closer to the main building to that previously granted

20/00567/FUL

Measured from 184 published Croydon officer reports written by this officer, with recited policy boilerplate stripped before any counting. These describe how this officer works and writes — they are not outcome predictions. Every quote is from a named public report.

Policy playbook — what this officer cites[3]

The policies this officer cites most in their own reports — times cited across 184 parsed reports. Whether refusals citing each survive appeal isn't traced per policy yet.

DM10Design and character
103 times cited
D3
76 times cited
DM28Trees
57 times cited
G7
55 times cited
DM10.6
52 times cited
DM29Promoting sustainable travel and reducing congestion
46 times cited
SP8Transport and Communication
35 times cited
D12
33 times cited
Which policies this officer leans on is subscriber intelligenceSubscribe to unlock →
Decisions by ward

Where this officer's caseload concentrates, 2020–26.[1] Click the map above to focus this page on a ward, or a row to open the ward.

Recent applications
Address
Reference
Type
Outcome
Date
26/00754/HSE
Householder Application
Approved
2026-06-01
26/00497/HSE
Householder Application
Approved
2026-05-18
26/00754/HSE
Householder Application
Approved
2026-06-01
26/00497/HSE
Householder Application
Approved
2026-05-18
Full application history locked
Subscribe to see all 482 decisions →
Consultants approved most— subscriber data
1. CANOPY PLANNING SERVICES LTD
2. Jameson Architectural Surveyors
3. Walk-in Architecture
4. LPR Design
At a glance
OfficerHayley Crabb
BoroughCroydon
RolePlanning officer
Experience
Applications482 (2020–26)
Approval rate73%
London approval avg81%
Who decides here
GovernmentMayor of LondonCouncilCommitteeOfficersDecisionsApplicantsInspectorate
Related investigations
When committees overrule officers like this one →
How often members depart from officer recommendations, and how those overrides fare at appeal.
How much gets decided without a committee →
The delegated share by borough and officer — where the real power over decisions sits.
Sources & method
  1. [1]Applications decided, approval rate, per-year trend and ward breakdown — London Borough of Croydon planning register and published decision notices, 2020–26. · methodology
  2. [2]Appeal overturn and decision-time benchmarks — Planning Inspectorate (PINS) appeal decisions and application date pairs; not yet computed per officer, shown as a dash until they are. · PINS appeals casework
  3. [3]Condition load — mean effective conditions attached to Croydon decision notices (grant/split), parsed from the published notice text; a borough figure, not yet split per case officer.
  4. [4]"How this officer decides", the policy playbook and all quotes — parsed from 184 published Croydon officer reports written by this officer, recited policy boilerplate stripped before counting; disposition text coded from their own reasoning with every quote machine-verified verbatim. Descriptive of how they work — not outcome predictions.
Methodology is published in full so every number is traceable to its primary source.