An Englishman who beat the system?
Good on him.
on 01/27/2008 at 08:09 PM
And again he has a loophole. If the 4 year law presumes 4 years of us having to look at it every day, he can keep it just by putting the wall of hay back up. They looked at that every day for 4 years and had no complaints. If he doesn’t like the look of it, he can put a facing on the *inside*.
That is pretty ugly. If it’s supposed to be a faux Norman castle, it fails.
Having said that, it’s his property. He has a right to show the neighborhood his poor taste in architecture.
The hay looked better.
Well, I dunno. All those tires hanging off looked pretty poor. And if I ever built a castle it would be a bit more imposing ... this one don’t even have a moat or a draw bridge! I think it’s more of a bijou castlette.
Funny thing though, the neighbors all knew he was building something, and they didn’t care. They figured it was a barn. It’s only when it turned out to be a house that they had fits.
I’m a building inspector and any thing here in Ohio, if it is not unsafe or unsanitary after 2 years is considered ‘existing’......setbacks, property lines and zoning come into play also.
Well I do have to admit, when I saw the picture I thought, “Gonna build a castle to go with that gatehouse? And you do realize that when you put the portcullis in, those windows in the center will have to go, right?”
But at the same time, with Tom in London fearing a developers free for all, I gotta wonder: How well would he suffer people dictating to him that he must spend thousands or tens of thousands extra, to turn his building into something he *doesn’t want*, on his own property, so that his neighbors won’t be offended by looking at it?
I’m okay with building codes, but dictating style, or lack thereof? Blow me, neighbors.
The mans name (Fidler*) is pretty appropriate. What he should have done is build the property as an “Animal Sanctuary” get in a couple of old nags and he could live there without planning permission. This is a loophole that a lot of crooks exploit. Personally I think he is a fool. I don’t much care for the planning laws, but without them you get a free for all and it would be a nightmare. Though that said the government here wants to build 3 million houses by 2012 or so. They have to look after the immigrants and assorted dross who have come here since Labour took office. In order to do this they will be squeezing the local authorities and running rough shod over anyone who objects. By 2020 there won’t be much of a green belt left. As it is London now encompasses most of North Kent and encroaches on the countryside more and more each day.
*A UK term for a crook
Don’t get me wrong, I’ve seen the same thing in my mother’s home town. Nice homes on spacious grounds surrounded by “trailer trash” who use their yards as storage for old cars and assorted junk. And yes, I find it offensive.
Nonetheless, I find it LESS offensive than dictating to people what they can and cannot do on their own property. To my mind, between this and “eminent domain” there is very little point to buying property at all anymore.Building permits, self defense, cowtowing to the irrational whims of muslim interlopers, lost desire to think and act in an air of freedom; it’s all the same; no backbone, no initiative, no balls, no hope. Goodbye Britain.
Building codes that concern themselves with more than basic safety are getting a bit out there. It really makes me appreciate this guy’s inventiveness. As the saying goes, he didn’t write the rules, he just played the game. I’ve had my own fun with 2 agencies that had to sign off on some building prints. Both said the plans were good, only neither agency was willing to sign first! A real Alphonse and Gaston routine. I can’t say anyone lied to finally get the required signatures, but there was some flexing applied.
Peiper’s comment about Britannia got my attention. Someone, the Trilateral Commission or some similar organization perhaps, the ruling gnomes decided that it would be a good idea to eliminate any sort of national pride or identification. When the world has been completely homogenized, it may be safe and quiet, but at what cost? The concept of Rule Britania was based on the idea of manifest destiny, just as much as our own and every other nation’s was. Manifest destiny encompasses more than the control of real estate. How much of our technological and economic progress was derived from this drive forward? Yes there were great conflicts, but there were also great strides made towards a global economy and the binding together of nations under a relatively few flags. Technology and ideas flowed around the world with the empires of Britain, Germany, France, Holland, Spain, Belgium, Italy and the United States (yeah yeah, we didn’t call them colonies, but they were just the same). Could someone tell me again why it’s a bad thing to have the leading economic and technological powers running the world?
01/29/2008 at 07:21 AM
