A man has knocked down his garden wall and built a driveway like his neighbours but is now being told he cannot have permission. Simon Evans addressed Brighton and Hove City Council’s planning committee after officers advised members to refuse his retrospective application for a crossover - a dropped kerb - and to remove a “significant” part of the front boundary wall at 20 Denmark Villas, Hove. Mr Evans successfully applied to the council for permission for a crossover but it did not include planning permission to remove the wall to create a parking area.
His home is in the Denmark Villas Conservation Area where planning restrictions override some of the usual “permitted development rights”. At the planning committee meeting at Hove Town Hall Mr Evans told members that six of his neighbours had long-standing crossovers and driveways. When his family moved into the house in 2011, a street tree prevented Mr Evans from creating a driveway but the tree was removed two years ago and he now has a driveway.
Mr Evans said: “We feel it does not alter the character of the neighbourhood in any detrimental way, let alone the aspects of it protected by the conservation area. “It does not result in a noticeable loss of the site’s historic fabric and setting, nor does it give the curtilage of the property an overdeveloped appearance, which would harm the historic character of the property.” Mr Evans wants to fit an electric vehicle charging point because, he said, there w.