Neighbour wanting a front extension, not pleased.

[Fermit and Sexy Sarah]

Equus said:

Fermit and Sexy Sarah said:

Also, to come on and call every part of our existence ordinary is poor form.
[quote]
Well, I'm sorry, but you came on here to ask advice about Planning. You even contacted me personally to ask for my input.

I'm simply telling it how its is: bluntly, in architectural and Planning terms, your property has no exceptional qualities or heritage status. It's not even a nicely detailed brick wall... it's as plain and basic as it is possible to build. If it retained original iron railings on top, or something, I would have some sympathy with your view, but as it stands it has no interest whatsoever.

It is your own perspective that is slightly odd, not your neighbour's.

The only justification for a Planning refusal of their proposal that I can see is on the grounds of visual impact on the aesthetics of the terrace overall (in whatever form of words they choose to wrap that up), and given the damage that has already occurred to other elements of the terrace, and local precedent set by other porches on the same street, that would be quite a weak reason for refusal.

I'm afraid that like it or not, you simply have to get to grips with that.

I'm not saying it has exceptional qualities or heritage status. However, it is a 146 year old house, which we would like to keep as period as possible.

On the subject of the the next door facade being butchered. Our neighbour too agrees it's a mess, one driving factor behind wanting to cover it. I have stated the best soloution IMO would be to remove the redundant lintels, put in a regular door, brick this in with best brick match, and do the same with the poorly executed void door fill. He's not wanting to spend for that though.

[Fermit and Sexy Sarah]

Elysium said:

Fermit and Sexy Sarah said:

Maybe not directly, but saying 'a very ordinary section of brick wall, outside a very ordinary brick terrace in a very ordinary Northern village.' is rude in my eyes. We're not even in the North

I have been receiving a fair bit of stick over the last 9 pages, but have kept my cool and manners when responding, but I will defend myself if something unjust or unkind is thrown my way.

Equus has been trying to help you as I did some months ago.

Telling someone that their wall is ordinary is not 'rude'. He is just trying to bring some reality to the situation. You should listen to him.

but when you extend that to say on a very ordinary road in a very ordinary village it seems like a put down. Maybe I'm being sensitive, maybe he meant ordinary in as much the same as most villages, IE not above the norm. Who knows.

[Fermit and Sexy Sarah]

Rewe said:

Equus said:

Then I recommend that you remove the electrics (all of them, but especially the satellite dish and TV aerial - I am reliably informed that Victorian satellite dishes were quite a bit bigger).

You'll also want to remove the bathroom, and revert to a tin bath in the kitchen (which should have no fitted kitchen units, incidentally) and a bog in a little brick hut at the bottom of the garden.

Remove the log burner and the parquet flooring, which are both dreadfully inauthentic. You'll need to replace all the doors and windows again, too, because you haven't got them period-correct.

Finally, you need to die of dysentery within the next couple of years and Sarah needs to contract tuberculosis, for that final authentic Victorian working class touch.

Hope that helps?

That post is really quite mean.

I think all of that was covered by the inclusion of 'which we would like to keep as period
as possible.'

Edited by Fermit and Sexy Sarah on Sunday 5th May 17:23

[Fermit and Sexy Sarah]

anonymous said:

[redacted]

Fair enough, I'd not seen them before. I'm still satisfied it will not contain sound though, and for that reason we'd still be unhappy at it being proposed.

What exactly are you worried about? Do you think you're going to be able to hear bathroom noises from your lounge? Or are you planning on standing outside your front door with a dB meter to check the levels?

My available sympathy is now exhausted and, to be frank, I hope your pettiness doesn't interfere with the neighbour's plans (assuming they are deemed acceptable and pass PP). Your entire objection essentially boils down to "I don't like it. Therefore, it shouldn't be allowed".

Edited by thetoxicnerve on Sunday 5th May 17:15

If we can hear workshop noises from inside the house I am satisfied that someone stood at our front door could hear someone going to the bog, behind a wooden structure a foot away.

And what, the pettiness that has suggested we'll not object if he moves it back a few feet, as he's proposed?

[Fermit and Sexy Sarah]

Equus said:

Why? We've got people down here in Norfolk who get their jollies by living in a settlement of wattle and daub huts and pretending to be in the Iron age fen-dwellers.

I have no problem with that, but if you're going to get all preachy about 'authenticity', at least do it properly?

And you continue


Nope, it's not rustic at all: I stand by my use of the word 'ordinary', and even that is probably being polite.

It is an absolutely basic and bog standard example of a Victorian workers' terrace. Even by the standards of its period, it lacks the most vestigial attempts at making it special, such as bay windows, moulded stonework or anything like that. The stone lintels, brick eaves and chimney detailing, etc., are all as basic as it was possible to make them, even in the Victorian era.

There was, of course, lower quality housing built in that period - back-to-backs and slum tenements - but most of it has now been cleared as unfit for modern habitation

You're wrong. We have studied the history of our village extensively. Our style of house was for one up from the basic workers. The modern equivalent would maybe be lower management.

This is a road behind ours, which the pit workers, the men digging would live. About 35% smaller square footage, and half the size of plot.

And as I stated, where possible. Of cause modern living requires upgrades from the Victorian period.

Edited by Fermit and Sexy Sarah on Sunday 5th May 17:48

Edited by Fermit and Sexy Sarah on Sunday 5th May 17:48

Edited by Fermit and Sexy Sarah on Sunday 5th May 17:50

Edited by Fermit and Sexy Sarah on Sunday 5th May 17:50

Edited by Fermit and Sexy Sarah on Sunday 5th May 17:51

[Fermit and Sexy Sarah]

alfie2244 said:

Nice copings on top of the wall

They are actually, aren't they. May see if we could find something similar as a reclaim.

[Fermit and Sexy Sarah]

alfie2244 said:

Fermit and Sexy Sarah said:

alfie2244 said:

Nice copings on top of the wall

They are actually, aren't they. May see if we could find something similar as a reclaim.

You in Staffs? Look like Staffordshire Halfround Blues to me.

Nope, Notts/Derby border. They are period authentic, historical photos show them around the area.

[Fermit and Sexy Sarah]

Equus said:

Rewe said:

Because that house has clearly been a labour of love for Kermit and Sarah, it marks the start of their lives together and they have worked hard to make it special for them. You belittled this.

Professionally you are correct, but the intent was mean.

I should perhaps state that I myself live in a very ordinary 19th Century agricultural worker's cottage, lacking any local character whatsoever. If it has any architectural or historic interest at all, it's that it is an example of a 'catalogue cottage', where landowners would literally order a set of standard plans from a catalogue to build housing for their workers... a product of Victorian national industrialisation taking over from local materials and vernacular building techniques.

I am not so prissy or delusional as to think that forming a new opening in a plain brick garden wall is going to critically compromise its historic integrity, however. Even the most rabid Conservation Officers and Historic Buildings Consultants acknowledge that all buildings evolve over their lifetimes to accommodated modern standards of living, and that itself forms part of the history of the building.

To avoid relocating an access gate, despite the fact that it will cause you significant inconvenience, on such spurious 'heritage' grounds is quite simply nuts. And if my neighbour wants to add an extension to meet his needs (we all have one already, added by the original landlord in the 60's to accommodate the bathroom that didn't exist on the original design), then good luck to him.

Fermit and Sexy Sarah said:

And you continue

You're wrong. We have studied the history of our village extensively. Our style of house was for one up from the basic workers. The modern equivalent would maybe be lower management.

This is a road behind ours, which the pit workers, the men digging would live. About 35% smaller square footage, and half the size of plot.

And as I stated, where possible. Of cause modern living requires upgrades from the Victorian period.

I didn't say that it was the cheapest or smallest in terms of scale - as I said, there was certainly lower quality housing, most of which has been swept away.

Interestingly, the housing you picture, whilst smaller, is of much better design quality than yours - bullnose copings on the garden wall, string course detail, peaks over the first floor windows.

Are you sure that they were for the pit workers? It's actually screaming 'railway housing' at me - the railways tending to take a bit more pride in their architecture, because it helped reinforce the prestige of their 'corporate identity', to couch it in modern marketing terms.

I think somethings been miss-remembered. Someone I'm sure made mention to removing the wall and putting in a fence. THAT is what we wouldn't want to do. On the flip-side, what you say about the gate on the side is exactly what I have stated we wish to do.

As long as the historians who wrote the books we have read are correct then yes, the smaller houses were for the base workers. Our village had a railway for both passengers, and taking coal out. I'm not sure if that could have any relation to the railway element?

O/T, which went badly wrong one day.....

Edited by Fermit and Sexy Sarah on Sunday 5th May 18:06

[Fermit and Sexy Sarah]

Equus said:

Fermit and Sexy Sarah said:

May see if we could find something similar as a reclaim.

You don't see any contradiction there, at all?

I can see as much that it's not 'original', but it is making it original. They existed on our street. If you were doing an E-Type restoration, and it had those horrible American spec bumpers, you'd take them off, and put back on what was intended.

[Fermit and Sexy Sarah]

Equus said:

Fermit and Sexy Sarah said:

...the smaller houses were for the base workers. Our village had a railway for both passengers, and taking coal out. I'm not sure if that could have any relation to the railway element?

Well, at risk of stating the obvious, Railways didn't have much by way of 'middle management' at a local level, being as they provided the high-speed transport links that meant it could be centralised.

I could be wrong, but your terrace is screaming 'colliery worker' and the other photo very much 'railway cottages' at me... the difference in styles is quite distinctive and characteristic.

Of course lower/middle management didn't exist back then, it was just for context. They would have been for the next rung up from lowest level labourers. I don't know, maybe the ones shouting at the workers. Probably 2/3's of the village is the smaller style, which would be a lot for a railway with not many staff?

For clarification ours is an ex-mining village.

[Fermit and Sexy Sarah]

Equus said:

Fermit and Sexy Sarah said:

...it is making it original.

Eh? You're taking something that is genuinely original and modifying it to make it...erm... 'original'?

I think that the word you are looking for is 'pastiche'.

And yes, if you're taking a strictly historical view, bdising an original car to turn it into a more 'desirable' model is equally reprehensible - you're destroying the genuine history. And don't get me going on 'restomods'!

Fermit and Sexy Sarah said:

Probably 2/3's of the village is the smaller style, which would be a lot for a railway with not many staff?

You've never been to Swindon, then?

I'm not a local historian, but from knowledge of similar settlements (I was born and raised in a former Yorkshire pit village), you may well find that the base level housing for the colliery workers has been swept away because it was deemed sub-standard. The big clue is often to look for a post-war council estate that replaced it.

Steam railways could be quite labour intensive, depending on the location... and common sense suggests that railway+colliery = coalyard & refuelling stop for locomotives.

You've also got a nearby village called 'Langwith Junction', I see, and if that doesn't scream 'railways', then I don't know what does!

Edited by Equus on Sunday 5th May 18:53

What I was meaning by original is I think that ours would have likely had them. By acquiring similar reverting it to the original look. A 1920 photo S showed me when talking about those 'tops' showed them present further up our road.

Langwith Junction was IIRC the junction, yes.

Much of the base worker houses were swept away in our vilage, when they continued digging under them, and they fell in

[Fermit and Sexy Sarah]

StanleyT said:

Fermit and Sexy Sarah said:

Equus said:

DonkeyApple said:

Fermit and Sexy Sarah said:

Equus said:

desolate said:

Edit: Couldn't remember the phrase my Dad coined at the end, added it now "We had the best house in the worst street, estate agents tell me that is the nightmare sale".

Edit 2 - Just seen Langwath up the threat - ha, not so far away, you don't remember a girl from nearby called Rebeca C whom went to Cambridge in 1991 do you. If so tell her she broke my heart but I've still got her Stone Roses LP which she'd hidden "our" polaroids in!!!!! (Aaaaahhhhh why do polaroids fade to blank over 30 yrs.....).

Edited by StanleyT on Sunday 5th May 18:55

That top comment really is gold! I don't recall her, but I'm not Langwith born and bread. I'm from Southwell, Sarah London. We'd prefer these locations, but ours would be a £260k house in Southwell (with a £180k mortgage) and god knows what in London.

[Fermit and Sexy Sarah]

Equus said:

StanleyT said:

.... Don't think being the smartest, nicest, commentedest on house is the best if you're getting unsure about the standards locally, you might get caught before the time to move on to another area before it is too late?

It does certainly sound as though you might be happier in a Conservation Area, with a nice Article 4 Direction in place, where you can take pride in your 'authenticity' and twitch curtains to your hearts content.

Otherwise, you need to learn to live and let live, a bit more, perhaps?

It would be nice, but it comes at a cost, and sometimes they go far too far. EG having to have single glazed windows. It would be nice though if there were minimum standards in place so people weren't allowed to completely butcher their house. And that's not a dig at the neighbour BTW.

[Fermit and Sexy Sarah]

StanleyT said:

Fermit and Sexy Sarah said:

Equus said:

DonkeyApple said:

Fermit and Sexy Sarah said:

Equus said:

desolate said:

Would having a toilet on the boundary be a relevant factor in the decision?

Nope, not even slightly.

Really, a toilet next door to our front door behind a wooden structure. Greeting a guest 'oh don't worry about the grunting and the stink, that's just the neighbour squeezing one out'

Would anyone be happy about that?

I would think that you have some kind of argument with regards to extraction as he wants it to be a kazi?

Is there any kind of case to argue that it cannot be a toilet?

No, really, honestly, I kid you not. The Planning system does not consider the proximity of a khazi to neighbouring boundary when determining applications. They just don't.

The environmental impact of odours from neighbouring development is a valid planning consideration, and if we were talking about the extract duct from the kitchen of a curry house they'd be valid concerns, but a single domestic toilet? As dickymint says: get a grip.

I'm beginning to believe that, what with this and "to completely destroy a 146 year old Victorian wall would be sacrilege in our eyes" this is really all a subtle wind-up on the OP's part.

I mean, FFS, its not the Taj Mahal... its a very ordinary section of brick wall, outside a very ordinary brick terrace in a very ordinary Northern village.

Perhaps the OP should seek to get the property listed, if it's really so precious...

It may be a modest house, but we like to have sympathy to it's history. You see that front door of ours? it receives regular compliments, because it looks so good, which it wouldn't if we did what the rest of the village did and stuck in a white UPVC one with gaudy stained glass.

You see the fireplace, which I spent 80 hours working on, hacking off plaster, brick acid'ing, replacing damaged bricks and re-pointing? Again, regular compliments. The reclaimed Victorian bricks passageway replacing the tarmac path, the same. I could go on, but I wont bore you.

What I am getting at is that when you put all these elements, and more, together the sum of its parts can make the house right, impressive, I'm struggling for the word. Compare it to 4 years ago, pictured some pages back.

So no, a Victorian wall is not going to be destroyed to install a cheap B&Q wooden fence.

Also, to come on and call every part of our existence ordinary is poor form.

Edited by Fermit and Sexy Sarah on Sunday 5th May 16:24

Edited by Fermit and Sexy Sarah on Sunday 5th May 16:26

I do understand where you come from in that scentance. My Mum and Dad had the same sentiment in their "forever home" in Midlands/Northern ex mining village, Eckington. They were always proud to have their front door commented on, they had the original wooden door (and sash windows) when everyone else had gone to uPVC on the street.

They tried selling in 2008. Everyone commented on how nice and well cared for the property was and "nice door, nice windows, looks out of place, needs modernising, how much off".

They finally sold in 2016, by then everything was uPVC and guess what, the street was becoming infiltrated by uPVC porches (about 1 in 10 houses).

My Dad must have wasted thousands on estate agents, he kept falling for up front fees even though I told him not to, of course got "Everested" in the uPVCisation of the house and they lost money on the nett difference when they finally moved after years of anguish about it - I can't even imagine what the angst of wanting to move for nearly a decade is, after two years I offered to buy my folks a place near me and I'd rent it them but no dice, too independent.

Sounds like you've the right idea in compromise, sounds though like your being taken down visually to lowest common denominator. Don't think being the smartest, nicest, commentedest on house is the best if you're getting unsure about the standards locally, you might get caught before the time to move on to another area before it is too late?

Edit: Couldn't remember the phrase my Dad coined at the end, added it now "We had the best house in the worst street, estate agents tell me that is the nightmare sale".

Edit 2 - Just seen Langwath up the threat - ha, not so far away, you don't remember a girl from nearby called Rebeca C whom went to Cambridge in 1991 do you. If so tell her she broke my heart but I've still got her Stone Roses LP which she'd hidden "our" polaroids in!!!!! (Aaaaahhhhh why do polaroids fade to blank over 30 yrs.....).

Edited by StanleyT on Sunday 5th May 18:55

Just re-read your post and one thing that jumped out at me is how 'originality' 'period' call it what you like does seem to go in cycles. We installed a wrought Victorian iron fire surround for one of the bedrooms a few years back, £350. The neighbour commented '30 years ago you'd have been paying them to take that away' and he's probably correct.

That door of your olds is probably now on ebay for £1000!

[Fermit and Sexy Sarah]

Equus said:

There are. They just don't happen to conform to your personal preferences.

There has to be a balance between personal freedom to do what you want with your own property, and controls which limit adverse impact on others.

Your problem is that you don't like where that line is drawn.

The neighbour and I are in agreement that if he needs permission for a front extension then the last owner should have needed permission to wreck the front facade of his house. I'm inclined to agree. As for things like the number of porches up the road setting precedents I say that should be nonsense. If I tore through the village at 70mph that wouldn't, rightfully, set a precedence for others to do so.

But, you may be right. Our standards are high. S's in particular, she got that from her mum. If their Henley house ever goes up for sale it will be worthy of a place on the Property P0rn thread.

Anyways. We'll be chatting to him tomorrow, and we should be accepting his compromise. We not a huge fan of it, but it will workable for us (away from boundary, fence at existing line, screenable)

Edited by Fermit and Sexy Sarah on Sunday 5th May 20:29

[Fermit and Sexy Sarah]

Equus said:

Fermit and Sexy Sarah said:

The neighbour and I are in agreement that if he needs permission for a front extension then the last owner should have needed permission to wreck the front facade of his house. I'm inclined to agree.

But the Planning rules say differently. Perhaps you and you neighbour should lobby the Minister for Housing, Communities and Local Government, but I wouldn't fancy your chances much.

Otherwise, we're just talking round in circles. As much as you may not like it, the Planning legislation says differently. Live with it.

Fermit and Sexy Sarah said:

As for things like the number of porches up the road setting precedents I say that should be nonsense. If I tore through the village at 70mph that wouldn't, rightfully, set a precedence for others to do so.

There are any number of flaws with that argument, but the main one is that speed limits are a clear and easily measurable criteria; Planning impact is not. When it comes to adverse impact on the character of an area (which is the only valid grounds for objection that I can see in this instance), how else can you measure it but relative to what's already there? If what is already there is crap, then it is unfair to impose an excessively high standard on further development.

Yes, there is the risk of gradual erosion of standards, but that's why we have Listed Buildings, Conservation Areas and AONB's - so that you can identify where there is character worth preserving, and impose special controls to prevent the rot going any further.

And before getting too preachy on that score, bear in mind that quite a lot of what you've done to the house yourself would be deemed unacceptable by a professional Conservation Officer, if it fell within their control.

Indeed, we are talking ideal world stuff. And that's what we all want, stuff ideal to how we see it should be. It's not just us going through this. S's olds place is just outside Henley, not in it, in a little hamlet, 12 properties IIRC. It's quaint, Christmas cardy, and very pretty. A (visible) neighbour of theirs has just gone and done some real Footballers Wives mods to their house, a glass box on the back, blue lights, all in full view. It's really upset them, it's so out of keeping, but sod all they can do. And that's next to a £million house not an £80k one.

Edited by Fermit and Sexy Sarah on Sunday 5th May 20:48

[Fermit and Sexy Sarah]

The conversation has been had, saying we will not submit any objection to it on the basis that it is pushed back to the white pipe, and that the plans he submitted are revised to state as much. We can then fence on the cut concrete line and screen it. I won't say happy days, but happier.

[Fermit and Sexy Sarah]

alfie2244 said:

Fermit and Sexy Sarah said:

The conversation has been had, saying we will not submit any objection to it on the basis that it is pushed back to the white pipe, and that the plans he submitted are revised to state as much. We can then fence on the cut concrete line and screen it. I won't say happy days, but happier.

Just watch out for a potential boundary problem if and when you sell

If it arose it will be no biggy to move a fence 10 inches.

[Fermit and Sexy Sarah]

Gazz28 said:

Hi, firstly any structure that is greater that 3sqmts and or taller than 2mts requires planning permission. Furthermore because he is altering the front facade of the house he will again need planning permission. If he is within 2mts of your boundary he will again need planning permission. You say ‘extension’ if built of a solid construction and classed as a living space again planning permission is needed and in this instance building regs as well. So he can’t ‘just’ build it as he thinks he can!

That's pretty much what we understood, others on this thread disagree. Anyways, plannings now in, so it's a waiting game. Not up on the portal yet mind?

[Fermit and Sexy Sarah]

Oh, and it is taller than 2 metres, so that's another reason he is requiring planning.