Gary Neville's 'Teletubby' eco-home rejected by planners
Gary Neville's 'Teletubby' eco-home rejected by planners
Manchester United footballer Gary Neville’s hopes of a cutting edge eco-home in the Pennine landscape near Bolton, Lancs, have been dashed.
Bolton Council’s planning committee has rejected the player’s application for permission to build the luxury 8,000 square foot home – including a 128 foot wind turbine. Committee members were swayed by more than 100 formal objections from local people concerned at the impact on the local landscape and access issues. Some opponents had likened the home to the set of the Teletubbies – the BBC children’s TV programme.
The property promised to be one of the country’s most innovative green houses, potentially achieving ‘zero carbon’ use, according to The Telegraph. The plans include local dry-stone walls, native meadow grass roof, solar panels, plus the wind turbine.
Already billed as ‘a house of the future’, the house tests the boundaries of current sustainable thinking in terms of design and construction, according to the architects, Make.
The decision will be a blow for Neville, 34, who has been heavily involved in the design process with the architects, and is said to be passionate about preserving the natural beauty of the area.
“The four-bedroom, single-storey family home is deliberately embedded into the contours of the Pennine hillside to minimise the impact on the surrounding moorland and has a roof of flora and meadow grasses which flows seamlessly over the property and into the landscape,” says Make.
It has been designed to consume less energy than it uses. A ground source heat pump, photovoltaic panels and a wind turbine will generate on-site renewable energy. The positioning and orientation of the property were carefully considered, according to the architect. It uses locally sourced building materials and traditional construction methods.
The site, on former farmland owned by Neville near Harwood, Lancs, sits on greenbelt land. Despite this, the council’s own planning officer had recommended granting permission – saying it qualified under a little-used “contemporary country house” clause in planning laws allowing buildings of “exceptionally high quality” to go ahead.
Neville attended the planning meeting with his wife and gave a two minute speech urging committee members to accept the “flagship green dwelling”. He must now decide whether to appeal to the Planning Inspectorate, which could overrule the decision and suggest a public inquiry is held.
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29 June 2010
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