![Pinterest](https://pinterest.com/pin/create/button/?url=https://uknews.evprotec.com/foiled-homeowner-to-tear-down-illegal-extension-after-council-officials-use-google-earth/&media=https://uknews.evprotec.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/0_PAY-BNPS_GooglePlanning_16.jpg&description=Colin Thomas now faces having to demolish his extension and decking after canny planners caught him trying to pull a fast one on them A council planning department has used satellite imagery in a bizarre planning row to rule a homeowner's decking extension illegal. Colin Thomas now faces having to demolish his extension and decking after canny planners caught him trying to pull a fast one on them. In a signed declaration to the council Mr Thomas, 65, "solemnly and sincerely declared" the decking at the front of his house and the single storey extension at the rear had been there for longer than four years, meaning they were exempt from council planners attempts to take them down. But the eagle-eyed planning department at Dorset Council used an innovative way to prove that the additions, for which he did not have permission, had not been there as long as Mr Thomas claimed. He stated the 20ft by 16ft raised decking at the front of his house and the single storey rear extension were built soon after he bought the property in 2012. His builder and friends who have visited the terraced house on Portland, Dorset, over the past 10 years told Dorset Council the same. But he didn't reckon on meticulous planning officer Thomas Wild who looked up the property on Google Earth and Google Street View. Mr Wild was able to use the software to look back at old satellite photos of the property and found that the rear extension and the current decking were not present in the satellite photos of the terraced house taken in September 2020. 'Therefore...it does allow for a conclusion that the rear extension was constructed between September 2020 and June 2022,' he wrote. 'Therefore it has been present for less than four years and has not achieved immunity from enforcement action on that basis." As for the deck at the front of Mr Thomas' house, Google pictures shows the structure was there in 2016 but it was not the same one. Mr Wild found different decking in the 2016 picture to one from){kind=link}
Colin Thomas now faces having to demolish his extension and decking after canny planners caught him trying to pull a fast one on them
A council planning department has used satellite imagery in a bizarre planning row to rule a homeowner’s decking extension illegal. Colin Thomas now faces having to demolish his extension and decking after canny planners caught him trying to pull a fast one on them.
In a signed declaration to the council Mr Thomas, 65, “solemnly and sincerely declared” the decking at the front of his house and the single storey extension at the rear had been there for longer than four years, meaning they were exempt from council planners attempts to take them down. But the eagle-eyed planning department at Dorset Council used an innovative way to prove that the additions, for which he did not have permission, had not been there as long as Mr Thomas claimed.
He stated the 20ft by 16ft raised decking at the front of his house and the single storey rear extension were built soon after he bought the property in 2012. His builder and friends who have visited the terraced house on Portland, Dorset, over the past 10 years told Dorset Council the same. But he didn’t reckon on meticulous planning officer Thomas Wild who looked up the property on Google Earth and Google Street View.
Mr Wild was able to use the software to look back at old satellite photos of the property and found that the rear extension and the current decking were not present in the satellite photos of the terraced house taken in September 2020. “Therefore…it does allow for a conclusion that the rear extension was constructed between September 2020 and June 2022,” he wrote. “Therefore it has been present for less than four years and has not achieved immunity from enforcement action on that basis.”