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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To be sick to the back teeth of NIMBYism

102 replies

KnotNora · 19/04/2016 16:06

I live in a village which is ruled with an iron village by a core of villagers who seem intent on sending us back to the dark ages.

This all started with a planning application for a housing development on a disused field. There was a very loud and vocal group who organised the no campaign and managed to get the application turned down three times (it's now gone to a final appeal).

Following on to this they are using the group to seemingly campaign against any development whatsoever. In the last year they have campaigned against single houses, a development of 6 houses, a planning application to change the use of a garage/cart house to a granny annex and now they are campaigning against an application for a single house on a crappy piece of land used by teenagers to drink on a weekend.

The main person writes a letter and then hands them out at the village hall and to all the old folks, gets them to sign it and then posts them off himself. He acts as proxy for online objections. Most of the reasons are scaremongering about losing our village, if we let them win once we'll be overrun etc.

He's just been round with another campaign to stop the demolishment of a house in the village which is owned by a train company. He wants the village to purchase it and turn it into a museum. It's a bog standard house with seemingly no amenity value at all.

AIBU to be sick and tired of a group of NIMBYs who don't seem to understand that people need houses to live in! It doesn't help that they make up the parish council which objects to any and all planning in the village. They shouldn't be allowed to scaremonger amongst the older members of the community like this.

OP posts:
CaptainCrunch · 19/04/2016 16:09

Move?

LittleLionMansMummy · 19/04/2016 16:11

I agree - spare a thought for those who are trying to secure legal travellers' sites.... it's an impossible task.

acasualobserver · 19/04/2016 16:13

Can you find like-minded people and start challenging their dominance over local planning?

BlueJug · 19/04/2016 16:13

NIMBYism is just looking after your own interests - which everyone does in one form or another.

If they built a Giant Housing Estate at the end of your garden along with a Massive ASDA plus petrol station - you'd be protesting OP. What is being proposed does not bother you so you think it shouldn't bother others. YABU

Original poster
KnotNora · 19/04/2016 16:13

Little lion, I can imagine!

I think they would combust if that happened here. Their FB group regularly posts things like "white van in village, driver looked suspicious, Irish accent, beware!"

I wish that was a joke!

OP posts:
Paperbacked · 19/04/2016 16:15

Move to somewhere with no active locals, where people are too apathetic/busy/uninterested to stop developers targeting villages without a functioning neighbourhood plan, or within a district council that can't demonstrate a five-year housing supply.

Original poster
KnotNora · 19/04/2016 16:15

The development was in my back field! Not mine but adjacent to my garden anyway.

I didn't oppose it at all. The village pub is empty, we have two shops left, we need new people here. The village is aging and young people aren't moving here as they can't afford to.

OP posts:
Upthepaddle · 19/04/2016 16:20

Where do you live, it sounds wonderful.

Looks down the road to the big, ugly new housing estate that's being built on a site that was formerly a lovely dog-walking field

WhatamessIgotinto · 19/04/2016 16:21

Perhaps they want to keep the village just that, a village. There are a couole of villages near me which have both been developed so much the last 15 years that they now meet. They are no longer villages. People are free to protest against whatever they want, just as you are free to push forward for development.

froomeonthebroom · 19/04/2016 16:22

Maybe you could Stand as a parish councillor and try to make a difference from the inside?

scatterolight · 19/04/2016 16:22

To my mind your villagers sound great. Conscientious and caring for the environment that they live in.

Nimbyism is what preserves our land from rapine developers. Local people who care for their surroundings are the only thing that stands in the way of exploitation by those who do not care a jot.

If you think that the village could withstand some new housing perhaps you should get involved with the Nimbys and see if there is scope for sensitively built dwellings that fit in with the character of the town?

revealall · 19/04/2016 16:25

YANBU. We have similar except all the locals are fine with people already in the village whacking on massive extensions. It now means the village is worth a fortune and totally unaffordable to anyone moving in who isn't on a ( good) London salary.
There is one chap trying to build a few houses ( and a couple that are " affordable" and they have protested vocally ).
The downside is they have totally clogged up the roads with stupid amounts of large cars ( most commute to Lodon by train) and the local pub is boringly predictable now .

Paperbacked · 19/04/2016 16:27

The village pub is empty, we have two shops left, we need new people here.

Well, that's the difference, then. There's a benefit to you which you feel outweighs the negatives of development.

In the case of my village, services are massively overstrained, the GP surgery is closed to new patients, traffic on the tiny Main Street is in a permanent jam because it was never meant to deal with as many cars as it does, school buses cannot pass one another on it, and there are four separate developers currently targeting five separate greenfield sites on the edges of the village. If all of them are passed, the village will have 220% more houses at one fell swoop, when it's not sustainable as it currently is.

Abraid2 · 19/04/2016 16:29

I am protesting vociferously against fields being concreted over here in our village. On the other hand, using infill and turning disused brownfield sites, such as an old corrugated barn, into houses seems sensible to me.

I do hate the fact that some cherished views and walks will not be available for future generations, when perhaps the population bulge will have dissipated. But the landscape will be gone for good.

Developers are going mad here, rubbing their greedy little hands in glee at being allowed to buy lovely fields and cover them with brick boxes. Very few affordable houses that I can see.

pitterpatterrain · 19/04/2016 16:30

I grew up in an area like this. Moved away as no jobs (as they campaigned against that too). The demographics of the area reflect it, sad but they only have themselves to blame. I would never go back.

Abraid2 · 19/04/2016 16:30

Oh, and good luck getting your child into a state school round here. You'll be driving them for miles because they're all full.

AlleyCatandRastaMouse · 19/04/2016 16:34

Planners only attach resident objections their due weight. You will find a lot of the development may have been turned down for other reasons water supply, waste water treatment, traffic on roads, amenity, conservation yadda, yadda.

Lamu · 19/04/2016 16:35

It's a very fine balance between the needs of a growing community preserving land from small developments.

There's a similar set up local to me where super fast broadband has been on the cards for years, unfortunately the very people least likely to need it are the ones objecting at every opportunity.

Same goes for the telephone mast to improve reception. Also a new development which includes a new doctors surgery!

New homes are desperately needed, not just in cities but in more rural areas too!

dotdotdotmustdash · 19/04/2016 16:38

I hear you OP. I live in a small rural village that has several new housing developments mainly occupied by semi-retired and elderly couples. My house is slightly older and one of the first of the 'newer houses' back in 1978. There are still a few very old cottages so the character of the main street is preserved.

Several builders have tried to build new houses around the village in the past few years, but guess who object the most? Yes, it's the folk who live in the last set of new houses! Obviously their house didn't destroy the village atmosphere, but any more homes would.

NotMeNotYouNotAnyone · 19/04/2016 16:38

Yanbu

I hate people that think a pretty view and keeping things exclusive is more important than people having affordable homes. They're alright cause they have their lovely big house and will no doubt help their children buy overpriced houses.

I know people look after their own interests but the council and planning department are supposed to balance the needs of all members of the community not just the vocal rich bastards

Owllady · 19/04/2016 16:40

Littlelion, that actually happened in our village. I found the level of prejudice and discrimination astonishing and upsetting. My great grandfather was a gypsy and other side of the family have traveller heritage too (though bargey)

EweAreHere · 19/04/2016 16:45

Sadly, you are describing a lot of people who behave like that: they have their home, and to heck with everybody else. Plus, it might mean their home is only worth a small fortune instead of a big fortune.

It's selfish. There aren't enough affordable homes in many areas, and there are plenty of perfectly reasonable, sensible proposals to build homes that are shot down for no good reason other than NIMBY-ism.

These same people will complain when their doctor surgeries/dentists close down when their GPs/Dentists retire and no one can be found to take over because nobody young wants to move there ... or can't! And they will complain when small local shops close because they can't survive and they have to find a way to get to areas with shops when they no longer drive, etc.

OnlyLovers · 19/04/2016 16:48

I hate people that think a pretty view and keeping things exclusive is more important than people having affordable homes. They're alright cause they have their lovely big house and will no doubt help their children buy overpriced houses.

This exactly.

Owllady · 19/04/2016 16:50

Our closest town is full of chichi shops, so if you need anything useful you have to get in the car and drive

(Sorry this is off topic but it annoys me :o and is a result of not wanting certain shops etc)

shovetheholly · 19/04/2016 16:51

GROAN. I suspect that what you describe is the case right across the country. We need to have a proper, national debate about the housing crisis and about the urgent need to balance the need for new built fabric against social and environmental considerations. People don't have a right to preserve things as they are now in aspic, when there are so many people who need homes.

I think it would be good if all those who were developing neighbourhood plans/objecting to development were forced to make alternative suggestions about the location of housing, i.e. to confront these issues head on, rather than simply saying 'no'. (And I don't mean just shifting it all into nearby towns - there can be a quota that must be freed in each place). I think there is too much 'objecting' and not enough 'solving' happening - and the post-political shifting of these debates onto civil society in the shape of neighbourhood planning is not an answer. I think communities have an incredibly vital and important role to play in planning, but those skills need to be channeled into problem-solving, not simple negation. Sometimes development really is suggested in the wrong place, or in a manner that is insensitive to the context of a place, and this could help to identify solutions in the shape of a wide range of things, from new parcels of land/resources to ensure that the remediation necessary on brownfield sites can happen to measures to tackle over-occuptation.