A Lancashire developer faces a massive bill after planning permission was refused for PVCu windows it had already installed in the re-development of a 19th century chapel.
Barnett Construction paid £115,000 for the PVCu windows and now looks likely to have to fork out another big sum for timber replacements.
The company originally submitted a planning application to Rossendale Borough Council to develop a Wesleyan Methodist Chapel into 12 apartments featuring double-glazed timber windows painted cream.
However, brown PVCu windows featuring a woodgrain finish were installed, “without regard to window details approved”, according to the council.
Barnett’s subsequent request to review the planning application and retain the windows, which stated that “the insertion of PVCu windows was an oversight on their part”, was declined at a meeting of the council’s Development Control Committee on January 15.
“To approve the current applictions, and thereby allow the PVCu frames and panels to be retained, would be contrary to national and local policy”, said the council’s planning department in a report prior to the meeting.
“Furthermore, it would set an undesirable precedent for the consideration of future applications in relation to listed buildings throughout the borough.”
Douglas Kent, technical secretary at the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings, told TTJ that there was a “rash of plastic windows blighting the country”.
“There is a lot of interest in saving energy at the moment but unfortunately there are a lot of buildings being blighted by double-glazed PVCu,” he said.
