Development Intent
AtlasWestminsterOfficersFrederica Cooney
Case officer · Westminster Planning

Frederica Cooney.

Active — last recorded decision May 2026

A case officer at Westminster with an approval rate of 77% across 525 decided planning applications, spanning 14 wards.[1] Decision speed and appeal performance publish when decision notices are ingested.

Planning officer525 decisions77% approvalSave
Westminster · 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 →
525
Applications
2020–26
Approval rate over time — tougher or softer 🔒Dashed line = London average
avg 81%76%202068%202174%202285%202383%202477%202575%2026
Approval-rate trend is subscriber dataSubscribe to see the trend →
What they decide — by application type
How they compareVersus peers
Approval rate77% · 68th of 76
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 reports424 officer reports parsed
31%
Approves despite concerns
of approvals record a documented reservation
16%
Negotiated approvals
approvals mentioning revisions/amendments
5%
"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 Westminster's average officer

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

Trees & landscape
1.76× borough avg
Outlook & amenity
1.55× borough avg
Flooding & drainage
1.54× borough avg
Bulk & massing
1.52× borough avg
Privacy & overlooking
1.41× borough avg

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

How they reason — coded from their reports

Cooney's reports cover larger, more technically complex St John's Wood/Bayswater/Notting Hill schemes — basement excavations, mansard/rear extensions, hotel conversions — and are the most granular in this corpus on cross-referencing planning history, testing a proposal directly against the immediately preceding permitted scheme where one exists ('the principal difference between the current and the permitted schemes is...'). She engages substantively with third-party technical consultees (Building Control, Highways, Waste, Arboricultural Officer) by name and records their specific findings rather than summarising them, and is willing to push back on a consultee's requested condition where she judges it unreasonable for the scale of the works. On design, she pays close attention to a terrace's collective architectural rhythm (whether a building's side and rear elevations already read as historically altered/neutral, or whether the terrace was 'originally designed to appear as a unified set') to decide whether departure from the host building's original form is acceptable.

Observable habits

· directly compares a new application to the immediately preceding permitted scheme for the same site, isolating exactly what has changed rather than reassessing from a blank slate

· names individual technical consultees (Building Control Officer, Highways Planning Manager, Waste Project Officer, Arboricultural Manager) and records their specific finding, rather than a generic 'no objections raised'

· will explicitly decline to impose a consultee-requested condition where she judges it unreasonable given the scale of works ('it is considered unreasonable to recommend a condition to secure these details')

· assesses a terrace's collective architectural unity/rhythm to decide whether a rear/side elevation's departure from the original form is acceptable, distinguishing already-altered ('neutral contribution') fabric from historically important fabric

What their reports consistently look for

· what this officer's reports consistently look for: the exact delta between the current application and the most recent permitted scheme for the same site

· what this officer's reports consistently look for: a named technical consultee's specific finding (structural methodology review, daylight/sunlight BRE test result) rather than a generic sign-off

· what this officer's reports consistently look for: whether a terrace's rear/side elevations are historically important fabric or already-altered 'neutral' fabric before allowing further change

Assigned Frederica Cooney 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

The principal different between the current and the permitted schemes is the complete demolition of the existing building behind the front fa�ade; the resultant form of the building will be as permitted in 2019.

20/01191/FULL

The Waste Project Officer has stated that the drawings submitted are not in line with the Council's requirements however considering the application site is a single family dwelling house it is considered unreasonable to recommend a condition to secure these details.

20/01191/FULL

Given the presence of similar extensions on the terrace, it is considered that the proposal, if refused, could not be defended at appeal on amenity grounds.

20/01292/FULL

Measured from 424 published Westminster 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 424 parsed reports. Whether refusals citing each survive appeal isn't traced per policy yet.

S29
29 times cited
ENV13
21 times cited
T5
17 times cited
DES 5
14 times cited
DES 1
14 times cited
DES 9
14 times cited
ENV 13
13 times cited
H3
7 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
25/08635/FULL
Full Planning Permission Application
2026-06-04
25/08636/LBC
Listed Building Consent Application
2026-06-04
25/08635/FULL
Full Planning Permission Application
2026-06-04
25/08636/LBC
Listed Building Consent Application
2026-06-04
Full application history locked
Subscribe to see all 525 decisions →
Consultants approved most— subscriber data
1. Savills
2. Rolfe Judd Planning
3. MWAI Ltd
4. Locksley Architects
At a glance
OfficerFrederica Cooney
RolePlanning officer
Experience
Applications525 (2020–26)
Approval rate77%
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 Westminster 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 Westminster 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 424 published Westminster 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.