Controversial plans for a new 3-bedroom clifftop house with solar panels in the grounds of a former Isle of Wight hotel have been refused – but the owner has now appealed the decision.
Paul Clark’s application for a 2-storey home off Ventnor’s Madeira Road, next to the Ventnor Towers hotel, was refused at the beginning of May with the council citing five different reasons.
Planners said the development would be ‘out of character with surrounding properties and detrimental to the visual amenities of the street scene, seascape’ and Ventnor Conservation Area.
They also labelled it ‘over-development’, due to it resulting ‘in a cramped and contrived form of development’.
In addition, their decision report flagged ‘harm’ to ‘high amenity protected trees’, concerns over ecology and ground instability and a lack of an affordable housing contribution.
Mr Clark’s appeal statement says:
“We are not property developers, we love the 150-year-old Ventnor Towers Hotel. Getting planning permission for a second dwelling was the only way that we could possibly fund the refurbishment of the existing building.
“We have spent years planning and discussing pre-planning with the council – we are disappointed with the Isle of Wight Council.
Article continues below this advertisement “At no point has it felt that the council has attempted to work with us to help produce an acceptable proposal; it doesn’t seem to have been given the consideration that it deserves.
“Our original pre-application advice in November 2021 received a favourable response and that proposal had three new dwellings, yet this proposal for one new dwelling was seen to be overdevelopment.”
The Planning Inspectorate will now consider the appeal.
Planners got it right. What an ugly building. Would be completely out of place there and not sure how building another house raises money for refurbishing the hotel?
“not sure how building another house raises money for refurbishing the hotel?”
erm.. simple maths
you build a house on land you own.. (cost £xxx)
Sell the house you have just built for £yyy
£yyy – £xxx = profit which canbe used to referb the hotel
say £100K to build, sell for £300K = £200K profit
And who in their right mind would by said house knowing they’d spend the next two years living next door to a semi-derelict building site? It also leaves the other residents with potentially 4 years of serious amounts of building works, excavators, suppliers trundling up and down a stupidly narrow road all day every day. For a grotty looking box that lets face it, if they’ve can find the money to build in the first place could also find the money to get the original one up to scratch…re-mortgaging along the way if necessary. Why would they be doing this? Because it’s easier to sell a house than a hotel in the current climate. For once, I’m with the planners.
Ventnor is so fragile it is not safe to ‘f art’
in case it causes a landslide.
Too risky to build in Ventnor.
“in case it causes a landslide.
Too risky to build in Ventnor.”
says the expert on geology & civil engineering