Plans to build 12 houses in Queensbury had to be altered after...Objections from neighbours?
...the police raised concerns that the design could encourage crime.If this sounds a bit familiar, yes, we have been here before.
The plans had to be altered by developer Eco Windows, after West Yorkshire Police raised concerns about a private shared footpath which had been drawn into the scheme.
The footpath would have run along the back of the townhouses to allow the householders to take their bins in and out of their back gardens.
But Lisa Reardon, architectural liaison officer for West Yorkshire Police, wrote to Bradford Council planners saying such shared footpaths could attract criminals or cause grievances between neighbours.'Could'. Also, 'could not', but hey, when you've got the badge, you have to use it, I suppose...
She said: "We do have some areas across the district where some neighbours use these footpath areas for flytipping, which causes neighbour disputes.
"If the gate is left open or unlocked, it allows any potential offender to enter this area and attempt entry into the gardens."
The scheme has since been redesigned, with this footpath removed, a new council report shows.So...how do the householders take their bins out of their back gardens now? Or doesn't that matter?
I suppose it doesn't. Not when you have pre-crime to fight...
'...architectural liaison officer for West Yorkshire Police'
ReplyDeleteI must remember this next time Gadget and co whinge about being cut to the bone.
Claiming a resounding success for the pilot scheme, our pioneering Architectural Liaison Officer is to recruit a whole troop of assistant Crime Anticipation Executives. What cuts, Julia?
ReplyDelete"architectural liaison officer"?
ReplyDeleteThose dratted cuts affecting frontline police officers!
I wouldn't live anywhere with shared access.
ReplyDeleteSo plod are so short staffed that that they cannot attend the scene of a burglary, or worse still can leave you trapped and dying in a wrecked car for three bloody days!!! Yet they can afford to employ an "Architectual Liaison Officer??? Sounds like something you'd expect to find in an old Monty Python Sketch!
ReplyDeleteGives me a new idea for a TV show though... "Gentlemen, you are about to enter the most fascinating sphere of police work, the world of the Architectual Liaison Officer!"
p.s. Apologies to Quincey M.E. 😃
I suspect the residents will quietly reinstate the footpath and the access, discreetly, once the council jobsworth has signed everything off.
ReplyDeleteA natural reaction to nonsense like this.
Happens all the time, you wouldn't believe what goes on.
Does this Architectural Liaison Officer have full RIBA qualifications? If not then just opening their mouth about architecture is just emitting so much hot air.
ReplyDeleteI am surprised that the company didn't state that the path is needed as a safety exit in case of fire, something the police appear to know nothing about.
It seems West Yorkshire Plods have an affirmative action hire who is too useless to undertake normal police work but can't be sacked because she has a vagina. So a post of some sort has to be created for her.
ReplyDeleteNote to self: add Architectural Liaison Officer to list with Diversity Coordinators, Council Climate Change Warriors, Minutiae Enforcers, etc for when the time comes...
ReplyDeleteAnonymous said: Note to self: add Architectural Liaison Officer to list with Diversity Coordinators, Council Climate Change Warriors, Minutiae Enforcers, etc for when the time comes...
ReplyDeleteIn my dreams the economy is re-vivified by the need to manufacture huge numbers of lampposts to hang these wretches from, but then I wake up, read what further outrages we tolerate being visited upon us and have to concede that we're too apathetic to stage even a token backlash.
This week I am mainly being pessimistic.
"I must remember this next time Gadget and co whinge about being cut to the bone."
ReplyDeleteOh, indeed!
"I wouldn't live anywhere with shared access."
It can work, we have a shared access drive with our neighbour. But then, both of us are decent people, and you are always at the mercy of someone who....well, isn't!
"Sounds like something you'd expect to find in an old Monty Python Sketch! "
The writers of satire must be starving these days. There should be an appeal for them...
"A natural reaction to nonsense like this."
Yes, life finds a way!
"Does this Architectural Liaison Officer have full RIBA qualifications?"
ReplyDeleteI very much doubt it. The 'fire escape' one's a good one!
"... for when the time comes..."
I have the same dream as Trevor...