Listed buildings and conservation areas

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• listed buildings - there are over 560 buildings included on Renfrewshire's list of buildings of special architectural or historic interest.
• scheduled ancient monuments - Renfrewshire contains many ancient monuments including prehistoric earthworks, old ruined buildings and industrial archaeology. 18 of them are of national importance.
• the 'Inventory of Gardens and Designed Landscapes', a record of nationally important gardens and designed landscapes across Scotland includes two locations in Renfrewshire.

More information on all of these is available on the page Built heritage and listed buildings.

Conservation areas
Renfrewshire's eight conservation areas are:

• Castlehead, Paisley
• Greenlaw, Paisley
• Houston
• Kilbarchan
• Lochwinnoch
• Ranfurly, Bridge of Weir
• The Cross/Oakshaw, Paisley
• Thornly Park, Paisley

Of these, Kilbarchan, Ranfurly, Bridge of Weir and The Cross/Oakshaw, Paisley are designated as 'outstanding' conservation areas. See the related content pages for further information on each of these.

Public Consultation On Paisley Town Centre Conservation Area

The Cross / Oakshaw conservation area covers part of Paisley Town Centre. The Council is investigating the potential to expand the conservation area to cover a large part of the Town Centre. As a first stage of this process, a draft Conservation Area Character Appraisal has been produced for Paisley Town Centre. This provides information on the history of the area, the planning policies covering the town centre and assesses the character of the buildings and landscape.The draft Character Appraisal is available to view and download below.

Draft Character Appraisal (pdf - 3.94MB)

The Council is undertaking a public consultation on the extension of the conservation area to cover Paisley Town Centre. As part of the consultation we have issued a newsletter which can be viewed or downloaded. This provides details of how you can make comments on the appraisal and an exhibition which is to be held to explain the proposal. The consultation period for the Character Appraisal runs until 21 August 2008.

Paisley Town Centre - Conservation News (pdf - 371KB)

You need Adobe Acrobat Reader to view these documents. Download Acrobat Reader here.

Permitted development rights
The Council has a legal duty to preserve and enhance the character of each of these conservation areas and they are therefore covered by additional planning controls. All of the conservation areas, except Greenlaw are covered by legal restrictions which remove certain permitted development rights. Find out more about permitted development rights on the page 'Do you need planning permission?'.

Demolition works in conservation areas
You need 'conservation consent' before you can carry out demolition works in a conservation area.

Treeworks
You have to give the Council six weeks notice in writing if you want to fell, prune, thin or uproot a tree in a conservation area . It is an offence to carry out the work within that period without the Council's consent. More information on the protection of trees is available on the right hand side of this page under the 'Trees and Nature Conservation' link.

Find out more
Information on listed buildings and conservation areas is available on the Scottish Government and Historic Scotland websites:

• National Planning and Policy Guideline (NPPG) 18 'Planning and the Historic Environment' covers listed buildings, conservation areas and historic gardens and designed landscapes.
• NPPG5 'Archaeology and Planning' describes the role of the planning system in protecting ancient monuments, archaeological sites and landscapes.
• A Scottish Government 'Guide to conservation areas in Scotland' is also available.
• Planning Advice Note 71 Conservation Area Management is a Scottish Government publication it provides advice on managing Conservation Areas.

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