Barony Street Residents Association (BSRA) has reacted with alarm to demolition of a boundary wall separating the communal garden tucked behind tenements on the north side of their street from a small development site on Barony Place.
A new two-bedroom dwelling (Refs 99/01132/FULL; 99/001132/VARY) is being erected on the former car parking spaces, waste ground and lean-to garage there.
Last week, builders knocked down the wall, but BSRA says the developer, Robin Keane, has since told locals he means to build above the line of the former boundary, and certainly won’t restore it unless required to by the Council.
Barony Street residents are convinced that planning consent for the site did not include knocking down the wall, which they add was part of an Historic Garden and Designated Landscape Site.
Residents are also disturbed by comments alleged to have been made by the developer suggesting that he will replace an existing gate.
They have now sought help from the New Town & Broughton Community Council and local elected representatives.
Spurtle visited the site this afternoon and spoke to Mr Keane, who is employing his own construction company to build the new dwelling. A former Dublin Street resident who says he well understands the area, he told us the wall had to come down last week when it became unstable during foundation work beside it.
He is building the house for his father to live in, Mr Keane continued, and is anxious not to sour future relations with neighbours. To this end, he now plans to build up only as far as his side of the boundary, even though the planning consent permits him to replace the old wall with the wall of the new property.
If locals still feel it is necessary and desirable, he says, he will rebuild the former wall using attractive stone at a later stage.
He has no plans to demolish the remaining section of wall closest to the playground, he told us, and so far as he is concerned there is no dispute about ownership of the Broughton Street residents' communal garden or access to it.
The building is scheduled for completion by Christmas.
That would seem to put an end to the matter. However, BSRA insists that a dense haar hangs over ownership of the land in this corner of Broughton, and that unfortunately it may only lift with the help of lawyers.