Angus house-on-stilts blocked despite plan for one-in-500-year flood defence

Angus planners have said no to a new house despite applicants promising its design could survive a one-in-500-year flood.

The three-bedroom house at The Neuk on Station Road in Barry would have been built on steel stilts over two levels.

And most of the living accommodation was planned for the upper floor – behind a bund to keep the Barry Burn back.

Applicant Graham Murray first lodged an application for the new home a year ago.

But it has now been blocked under delegated powers by Angus planning officials.

They said the plan was “expressly prohibited” under council policy.

How would The Neuk house combat flood threat?

Barry Burn flood risk has been a key factor in numerous planning applications in and around Carnoustie.

But architects Brunton Design said The Neuk scheme offered a greater level of protection than many other properties.

Those included flats at Links Parade and the famous Carnoustie Golf Hotel.

The architects said: “Mitigation is the answer.

“The design of the proposed house does not raise the habitable floor level of the house by 500mm or 750mm above the worst anticipated (flood level), but 2,600mm above it.

“We know its risk, have designed to take that into account and create a dwelling which is safe, even if a five-hundred year flood came back next week.”

And they said mitigation measures already carried out has allowed the site to escape recent major storm events without incident.

They also claimed an “arbitrary” Barry boundary settlement line had been drawn through the applicants’ garden.

Policy-breaching plan

However, Sepa objected in principle to the application.

And Angus planning officials waded in with a withering refusal.

“The principle of a new house at this location is contrary to development plan policies relating to rural homes.”

The said: “It involves sub-division of an existing plot in circumstances expressly prohibited.

“It provides a plot that does not comply with minimum plot size criteria.

“It extends ribbon development where that is expressly prohibited.

“In addition…the proposal is contrary to local and national flood risk policies.

“A site at risk of flooding cannot provide an acceptable residential environment and it does not provide a safe and pleasant development.

“The matters raised in support of the application do not justify approval of the application contrary to the provisions of development plan policy.”

It is open to the applicant to appeal the refusal to the council’s development management review committee.