Forum topic: Friends needed!

The Friends of the Lakes Estate Conservation Area does an invaluable job monitoring planning applications and ensuring the visual integrity of the Estate is maintained.

We urgently need new members to continue the good work - ideally a 'Friend' in every street in the Estate. Please let me know if you'd like a chat to discuss the role.

'Invaluable'??

'Invaluable' if you believe in protecting the aesthetic and built environment of the Lakes Estate, certainly as seen from the public domain. I guess not so if you don't!

Some of the suggestions and responses I've seen are verging on prepsoterous, let alone 'invaluable'.

Thanks David - it would be good to hear some examples (unsubstantiated comments can cause significant reputational damage to a group that are doing excellent work to protect the built environment). Suggest we take this offline - when could we meet to discuss?

Feel free to DM me. I won't name publically but a neighbour has recently had to put in applications a second time for like for like (literally identical, reviewed myself) window replacement. Some of the comments back were absurd e.g. all wood and stonework on the house has been painted cream/off-white for decades yet they were told the window frames had to be white. That isn't conservation, that is a lack of common sense that would have resulted in a horrendously ugly facade - unless also forcing them to repaint the entire front house.

I believe in conservation, not blinkered nimbyism. Real conservation and preservation requires investment not retardation such as that shown in the example above. Refusal to allow owners of real estate to invest in their properties will only result in degradation over time - total disincentivisation to invest.