By the Numbers: How Coventry's Planning Department Is Drowning in Duplicate Planning Images

Coventry City Council's online planning portal is carrying thousands of duplicate images across its public-facing planning application database — redundant files that are slowing search times, inflating storage costs, and complicating the work of residents trying to scrutinise development proposals across the city. The problem, which planning IT teams have been quietly working to address since early 2025, runs deeper than officials initially expected.

The timing matters. Coventry is in the middle of a significant development surge. The Belgrade Plaza regeneration corridor, the ongoing Bell Green housing expansion, and the Council's Local Plan review — which is due for examination by the Planning Inspectorate later this year — have all generated unusually high volumes of supporting documentation. Each major planning file can contain dozens of site photographs, architect renderings, and survey maps, many uploaded multiple times by applicants or their agents in different resolutions or file formats.

What the Numbers Actually Show

An internal audit carried out by the Council's Digital Services team in March 2026 found that duplicate image files accounted for roughly 34 percent of total storage consumed by the planning application portal — a figure that translates to approximately 2.1 terabytes of redundant data. That storage, hosted on servers managed through the Council's existing contract with a third-party provider, carries a recurring annual cost. Storage at commercial rates for that volume runs to several thousand pounds per year, depending on the contract tier.

The audit covered applications submitted between January 2021 and December 2025. Of the 8,400 planning applications logged during that period — a figure consistent with the volume handled by a city of Coventry's size, where the population sits around 370,000 — approximately 2,200 contained at least one confirmed duplicate image set. Applications related to the Friargate development zone, near Coventry rail station, and the Foleshill Road commercial corridor were among those with the highest rates of duplication, largely because those files involved multiple rounds of amended plans from applicants.

The practical consequences extend beyond server bills. When residents or councillors search for specific documents on the Council's public planning portal — the same system used by Coventry City of Culture Trust, local architecture firms, and community groups such as the Coventry Society — duplicates clutter search results and make it harder to identify which version of a document is the most current. That confusion has prompted complaints to the planning department's public counter service at the Council House on Earl Street.

The Replacement Programme and What It Costs

The Council's Digital Services team began a phased duplicate-image replacement programme in October 2025, using automated deduplication software licensed from a UK-based supplier. The programme is designed to scan each planning file, flag confirmed duplicates, retain the highest-resolution original, and replace redundant copies with a lightweight placeholder redirect. Budget allocated to the project in the 2025-26 financial year was £47,000, covering software licensing, staff time, and quality-assurance checks on a random sample of processed files.

Progress has been slower than projected. By the end of June 2026, the team had processed around 1,400 of the 2,200 flagged applications — a completion rate of roughly 64 percent. The remaining 800 applications, many involving complex or contested files, require manual review before duplicates can be removed without risking the integrity of the public record.

For residents or developers with active planning queries, the Council's planning portal remains accessible via the standard Coventry City Council web address, and the public counter at Earl Street operates Monday to Friday. Applicants submitting new planning documents are now prompted by the portal's upload system to check file names before submission, a change introduced in April 2026 designed to reduce future duplication at source. The full deduplication programme is scheduled for completion by the end of October 2026, ahead of the expected uptick in applications that typically follows the Planning Inspectorate's Local Plan examination period.