Overlooked

South Woodford resident Nina Stafford describes how plans for nine flats on the former Ark Fish Restaurant site on Hermon Hill have left her feeling overlooked by both the development and the planning system

Our home is about to become someone else’s view. At the back of our house is an open-plan kitchen diner where we spend our days. We’ve never needed blinds because there’s never been anyone to see in. From our kitchen doors to our back fence is about 12 metres, roughly the length of a London bus. Behind that fence is a car park. Then the letter arrived. Someone wanted to build on it.

Just two metres beyond our fence, there will be a terrace for nine flats, with another level of balconies above. Soon, we’ll need blinds for the first time. We’ll think twice before opening the back door or speaking freely in our garden. Then we read the council’s planning report. It said the new flats would enjoy “good levels of outlook”. Outlook over what? “The neighbours to the rear.” That’s us! Our kitchen, garden, bedrooms and bathroom are about to become someone else’s view.

Think it couldn’t happen to you? We thought that, too. Developers can spend months in private discussions with planners before residents hear anything. By the time a notice appears on a lamppost, much of the groundwork has already been done. You think there are rules. There are guidelines, and guidelines bend. Planning depends on judgement, and the judgement isn’t yours.

You think you have a right to privacy. You don’t. We thought both could be protected: the new homes and ours. Nobody was required to make that happen. Councils can accept there’ll be harm and approve, anyway.

We asked for basic protections, including no parties or music on the terrace after 8pm. They were dismissed as “unnecessary, unreasonable and unenforceable.”

You think you’ll get your say. You get two minutes in a council chamber. Our first vote was so muddled it had to be held again. We thought that meant another chance to be heard. It was marked ‘vote only.’ We sat in silence and watched it go through. You think you can appeal. You can’t. If a developer is refused, they can appeal. If residents lose, it’s effectively over unless they can afford court.

We spent months gathering evidence and invited the council to visit. Nobody from Redbridge came. Our ward councillor, Beverley Brewer, fought our corner all the way, but even that made little difference.

Schemes like this are appearing across the area as councils face pressure to build. But that doesn’t stop anyone asking how development can work for both new residents and existing ones. So, look behind your garden. A car park? A garage? A scrap of land? If it’s empty, it may be a target. Open every council letter. Back the South Woodford Society’s Neighbourhood Plan. And plant trees. Plant them today, before the letter arrives. And if it already has? Run.