Homes plan victory

JUBILIANT residents are celebrating this week in what they hope will be final victory in a planning battle.

A controversial application for two houses in an historic part of Gorleston was turned down on Tuesday.

Great Yarmouth borough councillors voted unanimously against the proposal for a pair of semi-detached bungalows on Riverside Road. The decision was greeted with cheers and applause by objectors who had waged a determined protest campaign to stop the houses being built.

A previous scheme for three new houses was withdrawn last September after provoking vociferous opposition from residents.

Furniture maker Steve Grimmer, whose 17th century house backs onto the site, spoke against the plan at the development control committee meeting.

The vacant plot had formed part of a rear garden to Mr Grimmer's home, which was once a pub known as the Rising Sun

He said: “We are delighted - the site was totally unsuited to this sort of development in what is a proposed conservation zone.

“The buildings would have risen several feet above my patio and blocked cherished views of the river from one of the oldest houses in Gorleston.

“This has been a burden on our shoulders and has taken up a lot of time when I should have been concentrating on work. I hope this is the final round, but if we have to fight another battle we will.”

Mr Grimmer added that the Environment Agency upgraded the flood risk on Riverside Road to the highest possible just before the application was decided.

Council planning chiefs had recommended that the plans were turned down and Yarmouth port authority raised concerns about the use of a slipway as a parking area.

Councillor George Jermany said Darby's Hard was regularly flooded and that the access on to Riverside Road was unsuitable.

Gorleston Conservative councillor Bert Collins described the bungalows as “the wrong buildings for the wrong area.”

No representatives from the applicant, Leicestershire based property company Parade Court, attended the meeting.