You’re an artist. You convert the ground floor into a studio. Despite a high, party wall to the rear of your pocket-sized garden, the light is perfect. The wall is that of a stable mews which once served the row of shops of which yours is one. It’s a part of historic old Stokey, the kind of space that any imaginative Council would designate as artists’ workshops, a playgroup or perhaps a community centre. For the while, it’s serving as a garage run by a local Asian mechanic, assisted by a workforce of four men. It’s not the most sensitive of uses, but it creates valuable employment and contributes to the cultural and class diversity which attracted you to N16.
1999: the owner of the mews, who lives in Greece and has never even seen the site, puts it up for auction. The Asian mechanic is concerned for his livelihood, but no one else seems particularly bothered. Like him, you don’t have the money to place a bid, but all the same you go along to the auction just to see what happens. The hammer comes down at £75,000: cheap. The new owners look like wide-boys, but they tell you they’re property developers, as if that might offer some comfort, what’s more, they live in Chigwell, which is never a good sign: footballers, pop stars and hoods. They assure you that their development will be ‘sensitive’.
2000: in January, the first of a series of utterly insensitive planning applications to construct four three-bedroom houses where one would be too many has been presented to Hackney Council and thoroughly objected to in a petition signed by the eight households backing onto the site. The developers want to use the high, party wall as the rear wall of the development. You and your neighbours realise that this will severely restrict daylight to your properties, and never mind issues of light pollution and noise pollution. On the off chance, you send a letter to English Heritage requesting that the mews be listed for its historical value. They show interest, but in the end conclude that too many of the original features have been lost. You wonder why similar features couldn’t be found to replace them. Surely that would be a better alternative to demolishing the entire site? It’s the first in a seven-year run of pointless conjectures. In May, the initial application is refused and a second, equally insensitive one for three three-bedroom houses, has been submitted.
2001: in July, the application is refused as inappropriate, and the developers file an Appeal with the Planning Inspectorate. The Appeal is heard in December.
2002: in January, the appeal is granted, but lays down a series of very specific conditions, notably that the height of the party wall should not be altered, that the three proposed roof-lights should be built as dormer windows facing away from your property and, to guarantee local employment, that the three houses should be specifically for live/work use. In July, work begins on the demolition of the mews. After three days of massive bonfires, the workmen singe a cherry tree in the adjoining park. You’re outraged. You head round to the site and bump into one of the developers who at the auction had assured you of their sensitivity. You complain about the now flaring tree. He tells you to ‘fuck off’ and that he’ll do what he ‘sodding well likes’. You go back home and ring the Council. They send in a Fire Officer who is given the same treatment. He retreats and returns with two policemen. The fire is extinguished. Next day it is relit and the cherry tree is finally destroyed. By the end of the year it becomes obvious that the developers are ignoring the conditions imposed by the Planning Inspectorate. You ring the Planning Office, but they can’t help because they ‘appear to have lost the plans’. |
