Planning permission - is this the biggest gaffe ever?

[wedderburn]

I wrote a blog entry on July 21st citing a couple of the common pitfalls lying in wait for many a would-be expat. Some of course are mostly out of our control, others we bear considerable responsibility for. The blog was mainly about the latter...

I mentioned a British couple that were in the process of moving near to us in Provence last year, and in particular the expensive mistakes made by not seeking to benefit from the experience and knowledge of neighbours-to-be. A ruined old farmhouse purchased near Vaison la Romaine, bought in the (peaceful) early spring... visited in the summer for the first time only to discover that the noise level from the constant flow of traffic through the valley, yards from the house, was unbearable. An expensive project was undertaken to erect huge earth walls to absorb sound and vibration, and renovation work then began. Last time I looked in - late last year - improvements were well under way.

Little did I know that they had, since my last trip down south, committed the blunder to end all blunders!!

Planning permission was for "réhabilitation". But according to locals the maître d'oeuvre 'allegedly' decided that the task of securing ancient and rather tumbledown walls was turning out to be bigger and considerably more expensive than originally estimated. The advice was to demolish and start from scratch.

Which they did.

Problem was - they had failed to get planning permission approved by the DDE first.

No problem, you might think. Well you would be correct - on straightforward building land. But this was out in the sticks, an old farm in the midst of agricultural land. And when you completely raze a building to the ground on agricultural land, you are left with... agricultural land.

A request to rebuild was rejected outright. Planning permission is simply not obtainable, in the majority of cases, on agricultural land. As things stand, unless the DDE has a sudden change of heart, this has turned out to be one of the most expensive 1.6 hectare fields in the Hexagon... [:(]

(Scroll to bottom of blog for photos etc...)

[Ormx]

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Oh my oh my, a lesson to be learned