kyrian

Amelie Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > The organisation really to blame here is the > Diocese of Southwark; it sold St Peter's Church > and its vestry (the Concrete House) separately in > order to make a quick profit. > Damn. I always suspected that there was some connection, but it was a bit hard to visualise with a bloody great road in the way. ;*) Google is being unhelpful on account of there being lots and lots of similarly named churches and vestries, so do you have a reference for that by any chance? Digital is preferable, but 'dead tree' would be fine. K.

Much as I hate to rise to thebeard's trolling... The land registry for 549 lordship lane shows the owner's details as being at 549 lordship lane. Postal mail to 549 lordship lane is being returned undelivered. I know both of these things to be facts. I would suppose council tax records (if any) and others tell much the same story, or at least would have done until construction on the cream travesty started, and the landowner was forced to come forward (or have it knocked down for being constructed in breach of regulations), which relatively speaking isn't that long ago. Under those circumstances, although painfully slow, I believe the council have acted correctly. You may witter about the 'old boys club' being at fault as much as you like, but I would say it did not even come into play (if indeed it has at the present time) until work on the cream travesty started recently. Even then I imagine that they would have to get a high court judge to give them some form of extra-ordinary dispensation to serve documents to the landowner by nailing them to a board at the front of the property, rather than in person. Surely a lengthy process by any measure. Unless, of course, you would rather the council started issuing compulsory purchase orders on properties and undergoing work on them without taking full and proper steps to inform the owner that they had done or were going to do so?

Please, let's not have this degenerate into another argument. It's already 7 pages of debate, it doesn't need to be elongated further by pointless repetition of arguments, ESPECIALLY NOT IN CAPITALS. With all due respect to disabled athletes trying to make the best of their lot, as I once heard 'arguing on the internet is like competing in the special olympics, even if you win you still look silly'. Further, it does not really help that much to elongate it with "me too" postings. "me too" postings could have been converted into a petition to do something a long time ago, when it would have made a difference, but that never seemed to happen (at least not that I heard about), and the time for it has now passed. (Apropos, http://www.petitiononline.com/) "thebeard" clearly has his opinion. I disagree, and clearly many others do too. Personally I am in broad agreement with "Huguenot", but clearly we do not need to antagonise "thebeard" any more than he has already wound himself up about this. I think the gist of the argument for demolishing the illegally constructed neighbour to the concrete house hinges on either: - that is was constructed without regard for the law. - that its construction so close to the original coincided with large parts of the original 'accidentally falling off', which is rather suspicious. - that building it seriously harmed the aesthetic standing of the original and it's 'house on the hill' look which chimes with the look of the similar house from the Psycho movies. I think we can all agree on the first point, even if we can't agree on the latter two. K.

Indeed. Someone's obviously never heard of the (although misquoted axiom) 'be liberal in what you accept, and conservative in what you send' on the internet. It is right that a historic building should be preserved, the waste and annoyance comes because nobody will stand up and do something about it, instead of just letting the building become the 'rot box' you describe. Its slow deterioration is down to neglect, and perhaps the odd push from the owner here and there. It is the 'odd push' that I am sure infuriates many of us, and the results of the aforementioned that infuriates others. Anyway, I'm glad to see at least the _appearance_ that the council has finally done something. I'm annoyed that it probably means I can't have it, but at least something _seems_ to be happening for the better. Let us hope that it does not come to nothing, like previous "appearances".

"whereabouts unknown" is about the only thing I can find :( K.

"mr choudry". Does someone actually have contact details for this fellow, or was the name just lifted off the council's notice on the outside of it? K.

> I'd buy the concrete house myself, and stop this > nonsense if I could get answers out of the right > people, and I've just done a proper query on the > land registry to that end. > Well, that's *really* useful, the address of the owner of the property is listed as the property itself. Mail to it is of course being returned undelivered. K.

Certainly seems as if the same is happening again by the way that another part of the property is fenced off again. Yet another cream coloured eyesore next to that historic building, although I've not seen any planning permission notices to build anything else. I think I'll report it to the authorities if I see building work start illegally a second time. I usually give people one chance, but these people have had theirs and flouted the law before. I'd buy the concrete house myself, and stop this nonsense if I could get answers out of the right people, and I've just done a proper query on the land registry to that end. My earlier query via someone who works there didn't get me enough info. It may be structurally unsound, but who says you have to keep the innards of the building??, IIRC grade II listed means you only have to keep the facade intact (not that the current owner has done anything but ignore, or flout that regulation!) so it wouldn't be a problem to do just that. The concrete house should absolutely not be knocked down, and all involved should stop mucking about and get serious about preserving and restoring this historic building.