Neighbour seeking Reetention

if he is only retaining 270 then the drawings must reflect that…. so i will assume that he is showning in this application that the 130 sq m original dwelling is still erect…??

if not he needs to retain the whole house as constructed….

aimee, out of curiosity why are you objecting to this?

@Archie wrote:

aimee, out of curiosity why are you objecting to this?

Hi ,
Thanks for your reply. On his drawings, he actually shows the as built house and also the outline of the house th received planning, which was never built.

I am objecting because our house, which is in the countryside and is old stlye, used to be a detached and out on its own with a little stone cottage beside it. It now has a massive modern 400sqm house built just meters away (our house which has been there for 150 years is just 5m from boundary wall and neighbour is 0.7m to the wall at the closest point. This was okay when it was just a little cottage, but given the large increase in height (1.7m compared with what was granted, I’m not sure what original cottage height was), it is completely overbearing. There are other issues like the neighbours windows that look straight into our bathroom and the devaluation to our house.

I’m not sure that my reasons would be strong enought to sway the planners as I am just one person so I am trying to get a good argument together. I am quite sure (having read the planning guidelines) that he has not complied with them (at all) as there are very strict guidelines for the area.

Thanks,
Niamh

Niamh

What you are talking about in your objection is more of a complaint about the process of the planning application that your neighbour has, than an objection, as such.

My advice would be to separate your points clearly in your objection letter, in case the planner decides that your point about how much retention the applicant should have applied for is not worth pursuing with an additional information request (if the house is built as is more than 7 years, it is a bit of a moot point anyway).

E.g., say

1) This should be retention for x metres instead of y metres in the first place because…etc.

and then go on to:

2) Apart from that legal objection, his application is a bad idea because….

Also, you should make POSITIVE points in your letter rather than just whinge about it, e.g.: “my neighbour could improve the development if he moved his boiler x metres to the west…because…etc.

Also, avoid language like inferring that your house is an “old cottage” and your neighbours is an “ugly new bungalow” unless you have a valid conservation/heritage argument to make as it will just sound snobby, and that could irritate some types of planners.

If part of his new-build which is going for retention (ie not granted planning already) is only 0.7m from the boundary wall as you say he could be in breach of local development plan regulations which usually stipulate a minimum of 1.5m from boundary to house and often more in rural areas, although upon re-reading it sounds like the existing house was only 0.7m from the boundary to begin with. But of course the existing house was completely demolished and he’d never have gotten permission for a brand new house to be built that close to the boundary… hmmm. Sorry train of thought typing there.

Sounds like a fairly awful state of affairs. If right was right he should be made demolish whats been built but unfortunately that doesn’t seem to happen in more rural local authority areas. This attitude of “ah sure they’ll never make us demolish it, lets just fire away and do what we want and feck the neighbours” needs to be nipped in the bud.

Not much help I know but you have my sympathy.

@BTH wrote:

If part of his new-build which is going for retention (ie not granted planning already) is only 0.7m from the boundary wall as you say he could be in breach of local development plan regulations which usually stipulate a minimum of 1.5m from boundary to house and often more in rural areas, although upon re-reading it sounds like the existing house was only 0.7m from the boundary to begin with. But of course the existing house was completely demolished and he’d never have gotten permission for a brand new house to be built that close to the boundary… hmmm. Sorry train of thought typing there.

Sounds like a fairly awful state of affairs. If right was right he should be made demolish whats been built but unfortunately that doesn’t seem to happen in more rural local authority areas. This attitude of “ah sure they’ll never make us demolish it, lets just fire away and do what we want and feck the neighbours” needs to be nipped in the bud.

Not much help I know but you have my sympathy.

this will, in the very near future…

there is legislation being written up to remove the 7 year statute of limitations on unauthorised developments…..
how exactly it will be worded im not sure… but theres a possibility every unauthorised development could be subject to enforcement action….

@aimee wrote:

It now has a massive modern 400sqm house built just meters away (our house which has been there for 150 years is just 5m from boundary wall and neighbour is 0.7m to the wall at the closest point. This was okay when it was just a little cottage, but given the large increase in height (1.7m compared with what was granted, I’m not sure what original cottage height was), it is completely overbearing. There are other issues like the neighbours windows that look straight into our bathroom and the devaluation to our house.

But why did you not report this to the Planning Authority during the construction?

@Archie wrote:

But why did you not report this to the Planning Authority during the construction?

I wasn’t living in the house at the time as was having some work done on my own house (with full planning permission!). The neighbours house went up very quickly. But yes, I should have realised something was amiss.

@aimee wrote:

I wasn’t living in the house at the time as was having some work done on my own house (with full planning permission!). The neighbours house went up very quickly. But yes, I should have realised something was amiss.

Dont get me wrong here aimee as Im not having a go. I just fail to understand how your neighbour could have carried out this development without you realising it. You may not have been living in your house at the time but Im sure you visited often enough and you would have seen all this work in progress.

Even when the neighbour made a planning application you surely would have checked it out and when the works commenced you definitely could not have missed it given the sheer bulk involved. I find it all very strange that you wait until now before deciding to do anything about it. I just suspect that there are other reasons behind this.

For personal reasons I never get involved in objections and that is why I am so sceptical as to the reasons behind your objection.