Highway licences
- Fees are chargeable for most types of applications.
- Minimum four weeks notice is required - longer for more complex applications and if closures are required.
Local authority consents
Local authorities issue licences for activities such as street trading, tables & chairs and pavement cafés, but only with our consent. For consideration of consents for basement openings, flag poles, pavement café seating areas, street trading and/or refuse storage bins, you should first contact the relevant local authority, who will then consult with us.
Road closures
If any consent involves a road closure (to accommodate a crane lift, for example) then we can arrange for temporary road closures as part of the process. There are statutory procedures which must be followed, with advertising costs of £2,050 to £7,000 (depending on location). Processing time is six to eight weeks for partial road closures and 10-12 weeks for full road closures.
Application forms
As the highway authority for the red routes, we license these applications.
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Banners / Hanging Baskets over the Highway
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Builders Skip
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Building Materials
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Building over the Highway
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Column Attachments
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Crane Oversail
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Excavation in the Highway
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Festive Decorations
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Filming on London's Road Network
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Hoardings
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Landscaping / Planting
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Lights in Trees
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Mobile Apparatus
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Mobile Crane
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Pit Lane (Temporary Vehicle Loading/Unloading Area)
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Scaffolding
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Statues / Artwork
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Temporary Traffic Signs
Street works
If you need a licence to do street works such as installing and maintaining utility services, you'll need to apply for a section 50 licence under the New road and Street Works Act 1991.
Highway licence policies
These three documents outline our policies for considering highway licence applications:
Privacy notice
TfL, its subsidiaries and service providers will use your personal information for the purposes of administering your highway licence application, including where relevant, issuing an invoice and processing any payment. We will retain your information after the issue of the licence for the purposes of managing any correspondence, ensuring compliance with the licence terms and establishing and defending legal rights.
On some occasions, we may need to share your information with associated organisations or their agents for these purposes. Your personal information will be properly safeguarded and processed in accordance with the requirements of privacy and data protection legislation. To find out more about how TfL handles personal data see our privacy and cookies pages.