Does anyone here have experience of planning permission, when neighbours refuse to apply? Does the planning authority (ours is a national park) have any power if the neighbours just ignore planning rules? Is there any other recourse to action, without taking them to court? The main issue we have, is privacy..
I live in a row of terraces, with back gardens on a steep slope. The neighbours next door, in the end terrace, have built an elevated, extended platform in their garden. Because of the common sloping nature of our gardens, it is raised about 8 feet above our heads when we stand in our garden, which we flattened into a lawn terrace, near 20 years ago. If we put up a fence for privacy, it would have to be 8 feet tall just to reach their feet! It is a wooden structure held in by long beams of wood, that they have concreted in and hidden under more earth at the top, on the same level as our top terrace gardens, next to an ancient hedge line. It is as high as the roof, and looks down into our back bedroom window. The room is largely unused, but our grandchildren sleep in there sometimes, including a teenager. (And these people publicly spout their concern for the environment, and 'community values'!)
Anyway...what is worse, prior to this, they told us they were putting up 'a raised patio' (we just thought that meant just a few feet above the lower level) which we have no problem with. Then they snuck around, avoiding us; then to treat us to an ongoing cement mixer with around a tonne or more of cement, and power tools all through spring lockdown, summer, and only to pause in November with their snooping tower aloft. No planning. I'm writing this now, because scaffolding has gone up around their house now, and Mr Power-Tools-Mid-life-crisis man is at it again. Planning tell us that they are still waiting for an application, and that it is overdue, but they can't legally say anything to us, though they have been sympathetic. (The nosy neighbours have bought their social housing, we still rent).