WWGDD?: Knocking down a home for being slightly too tall

[kindai]

Mods poll please?

What would GD Do?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-stoke-staffordshire-44068562

I look at this in 3 frames of mind.

1) Good, builders should be held to account, if they flaunt the rules and expect them to be bent afterwards, whats the point in having them in the first place?

2) It is a bit harsh.

3) £200k to shave that off the top? Get off it, you can buy a whole frikkin house for that price, who they trying to kid.

I must admit, given its hardly the most dire of transgressions looking at the pictures, I would probably still vote against it on the principals of fairness.

 

[Raymond Lin]

It’s a big house, and it is ALWAYS more costly to change something than start from scratch. To demolish a house only takes some TNT, to change that roof takes man power to take it down brick by brick. Hence the cost.

And they should have built it as per planning permission and original design, how they ended up 30inches too tall is bizarre.

 

[Redrum]

1 and 3. If there are no consequences of breaching planning or if the consequences are worth suffering, it defeats the point of having planning permission and is not fair to those that do play by the rules.

I'm sceptical it would cost 200k to put a lower roof in and I'm also sceptical about their pleas of poverty considering they've got a new 500k house, but if it genuinely would cost 200k then that is excessive, so I'd perhaps say what would be fair is a whopping fine in the tens of thousands, some of which should be given to those with genuine reasons to have objected.

 

[sideways14a]

I got the impression when i saw this that they knew fine well it was too big when it went up..dunno why to be honest.
31 objections means not happy neighbours, wouldnt be surprised if there is more to this as thats a lot of ****** folk for a couple of feet extra height.

 

[Rotty]

you don't "accidentally" build it 30 inches too high

 

[Dr House]

They tried to play the game by filing a retrospective planning application and lost.

 

[Slurm]

They should just raise the height of the driveway and garden by a couple of feet.

 

[Goksly]

Surely if it was accidentally built too tall, the builder would have the foot the bill? Unless he was working under instruction of the home owners
Busted plain and simple. Rip it down.

 

[southernorth]

Stoke-on-Trent

Demolish the whole thing, and the house too

 

[Thekwango]

you don't "accidentally" build it 30 inches too high

They tried to play the game by filing a retrospective planning application and lost.

Exactly. Cope it and start again and build within the agreed planning permissions. Or reduce the roof height.

They should just raise the height of the driveway and garden by a couple of feet.

doesn't work like that

 

[BDEE]

How on earth do you manage to build that without permission in place first. Of all the stupid things to do.

It does seem daft to suggest it should be demolished, but agree with the requirement for it to be put right within the allowable size.

 

[Thekwango]

31 objections means not happy neighbours, wouldnt be surprised if there is more to this as thats a lot of ****** folk for a couple of feet extra height.

31 objections and 7 letters of support. Rather coincidentally 7 people live in the house!

 

[Hotwired]

I got the impression when i saw this that they knew fine well it was too big when it went up..dunno why to be honest.
31 objections means not happy neighbours, wouldnt be surprised if there is more to this as thats a lot of ****** folk for a couple of feet extra height.

...and gigantic windows overlooking the area which is a privacy issue.

If it wasn't in the planning application people can reasonably be ****** off that someone built whatever they wanted then filed for permission for it to be legal.

Sob story and 5 children or not its taking the **** and can be used by anyone else as an example if others are not allowed to build whatever they want.

Same rules for everyone.

 

[Mynight]

I really don't see how this could happen accidently. If the builders are that bad then I'd be concerned about the rest of the place as well (I imagine they'd have to pay if they truely were to blame).

I wonder what the other houses in the area look like. Based on the roof of the neighbours I imagine it's not at all in keeping with the area.

 

[Hotwired]

I imagine the builders built what they were told to build.

 

[Dr House]

I imagine the builders built what they were told to build.

Yep.

Or they had no planning and just build the house and tried to get retroactive planning ??

 

[Werewolf]

How on earth do you manage to build that without permission in place first. Of all the stupid things to do.

It does seem daft to suggest it should be demolished, but agree with the requirement for it to be put right within the allowable size.

There is zero way this was any form of honest mistake, so they should either demolish it, or rebuild it with the lower roof, going by the article it sounds like the dormer windows were also not approved, so my suspicion is that they tried to sneak another floor into it and making it more usable by raising the roof that extra 76cm (which will make a huge difference for rooms in the loft space).

If it was the builders that did it before the owners bought it (although their conveyancer should probably have spotted the issue) then ultimately it should be down to the builders to pay for it to be sorted, and any loss of value.
If it was the homeowner who instructed the builders to do it, then it's the homeowners full fault.

 

[terley]

I don't understand how people even have the time to look up the planning permission of something being built nearby, then go to the trouble of complaining..

Some people genuinley have far too much time on their hands...

Having watched grand designs since it began, i can say with absolute sincerity that i despise curtian twitching nosy neighbours that care far too much about other peoples lives.

 

[Hotwired]

I don't understand how people even have the time to look up the planning permission of something being built nearby, then go to the trouble of complaining..

Some people genuinley have far too much time on their hands...

Having watched grand designs since it began, i can say with absolute sincerity that i despise curtian twitching nosy neighbours that care far too much about other peoples lives.

Before anything is built you have to show your planning application to the public who get to raise any issues.

The council can look at issues raised and ignore them as irrelevant or if an issue is genuine they can block the building or request changes before they will allow it.

When someone builds something which was not in the planning application they lied to the people around them and the council. The whole building is now illegal and the complaints are not what makes it illegal.

 

[terley]

Before anything is built you have to show your planning application to the public who get to raise any issues.

The council can look at issues raised and ignore them as irrelevant or if an issue is genuine they can block the building or request changes before they will allow it.

When someone builds something which was not in the planning application they lied to the people around them and the council. The whole building is now illegal and the complaints are not what makes it illegal.

Yeah i know how planning permission works.

But these plans aren't canvased to neighbours, they are supposed to be "notified" but in the same sense i don't specifically know the guides regarding notification.. as far as i know it could follow a Douglas Adam's HHGTTG style..