Man at war with council after raising extension by 23 INCHES

A row over an garden platform has erupted on a quiet residential street after the property owner extended it by just 23 inches.

The man who built the elevation has now been ordered by the council to flatten it or face legal action after neighbors say their privacy is under threat, calling the platform a 'monstrosity'.

The owner of the house in Chapel Close, Dinas Powys, near Cardiff, south Wales, had already upset some locals when he built a huge extension on the side of his semi-detached property.

The extension was so intrusive on one woman's views from the back of her home that she was forced to plant a row of fast-growing evergreens to block out the building.

The woman, who asked not to be named, told Mailonline: 'I had to live through the noise and nuisance of the extension going up in my eye line, then he goes and ruins another neighbour's privacy with this darned raised garden platform.

'Fortunately it won't bother me because I've planted all these trees to blot him out. But I feel very sorry for the neighbours who are affected by the latest monstrosity he's concocted.'

The owner of the property was unavailable for comment and the neighbour who complained about the garden development did not wish to comment.

But following the complaint Vale of Glamorgan Council have ordered the owner to flatten the raised part of the garden.

The authority's planning committee heard the height of the offending part of the rear garden had been increased by 600mm - leaving it standing at 1.2m tall. 

As a result, the privacy of the homeowner's neighbour had been significantly reduced, planners heard.

When council officials visited the property in August 2023, following the complaint, they calculated that the new tier reduced the height of the fence dividing the properties from 1.8m to 1.2m.

Planners duly slapped an enforcement notice on the property, which will require the homeowner to lower his garden to a height of no more than 300mm above the original ground level.

The hearing, on September 26 this year, came after the homeowner had refused to take action to either reduce the height of his raised terrace or submit a planning application seeking to explore other options.

But one councillor who sits on the planning committee, Christine Cave, said the authority had been 'hypocritical' to intervene.

Ms Cave likened the situation to what happened at the former Eagleswell Primary School site in nearby Llantwit Major, where portable homes were allowed to be set up through special planning powers.

She said: 'When we made the site visit [to Eagleswell] and we actually asked why the ground had been built up and why the buildings could then be overlooking into peoples' gardens.

'This seems a bit hypocritical to me here, that the council have done exactly the same on a much grander scale with huge overlooking of peoples' gardens and now we are being told it is not permissible.'

Vale of Glamorgan Council allowed the development of the site at Llantwit Major through what is known as permitted development rights.

The planning powers are usually used in an emergency - in that particular case for the housing of Ukrainian refugees - but the scheme must eventually get planning permission within 12 months of the date of construction starting. 

The council's planning committee voted to give the site, made up of 90 units, permission to remain in place for a minimum of five more years in July this year.

Residents were unhappy the plans had been allowed to go through without any consultation, with some of the units just metres away from residents' gardens. Some are able to see into the gardens of the portable homes from their upstairs windows.

In the case of the Chapel Close garden development, the council's operational manager for planning and building control, Liam Jones, said the committee could only consider the merits of the enforcement notice application in front of them and did not comment on the Eagleswell development.

He said: 'Here we have a situation where the homeowner has erected a surface that allows permanent direct overlooking into the neighbouring property. 

'I don't propose to consider the merits of a different scheme considered by this committee, so we have to treat this on its own merit.'

A council spokesperson said: 'Every planning application is different with each considered on its merits. 

'In this case it was decided that the development would involve and unacceptable loss of privacy for a neighbouring property so the application was rejected.'