Residents fought, successfully, to stop a neighbour extending her house after claiming it would be like “peering at an ugly four metre high brick wall and roof.”
Others living nearby also protested, telling East Cambs planning officers the size and scale of the extension would be “un-neighbourly and of an overshadowing and overbearing nature”.
Councillors agreed and vetoed proposals by Melinda Nettleton to extend her Cardinals Way mid terrace home in Ely. She had also planned to install solar panels on her garage but that was also refused.
The council’s planning meeting heard of a number of ‘major concerns’ from both councillors and unhappy neighbours.
Councillors were told the existing property is a mid-terraced house set in a small residential development which was designed to “look and feel like part of the existing city fabric”.
Planning officer Richard West said Mrs Nettleton had amended the proposal by reducing the extension from 3.6 to three metres in order to increase the garden area and decrease the impact on adjoining neighbours.
However, this was not enough to sway either the committee or the neighbours’ minds.
A neighbour said in a letter that if the proposal were to be accepted, it would have a “serious impact on my home and standard of living.
“During the 10 years I have lived here, I have enjoyed and spent a lot of time in my garden, as there is no frontage to speak of. Likewise so do my neighbours at No.45, who like myself, are retired.
“We both would be peering at an ugly four metre high brick wall and roof.”
They added that because of the proposed height, size, scale and bulk, it would be “un-neighbourly” and of an “overshadowing and overbearing nature” and cause light reduction.
“It is attempting to enlarge a house that wasn’t intended to be accommodated on a plot of this size, reducing the garden area and unsympathetic in design”, she said.
Another neighbour said: “We feel this proposal would compromise the carefully considered design concept of the estate and it would restrict our need for sunlight to an unacceptably low level.
“We suggest that this overlarge extension would be the first unfortunate example, in 15 years, of over-development.”
The council, in refusing the application, said it would have an overbearing impact on and result in a loss of light to neighbours.
It would also have a “negative visual impact” and failed to have regard to the character of the conservation area.
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