We have been aware of the intention to build this extension since we
originally moved into our house in 1998. At this time it was merely
heresay from the neighbours (the additional bathroom and bedroom is for
their disabled son).

In August 2003 we received provisional plans, and it appears that the
extension is going to be huge, also to ensure it is in-keeping with the
neighbourhood it will have a pitched roof.

As it stands at the moment our back garden loses light in late
afternoon/early evening because we are on the east side of a
substantial hill. The extension proposed will be 8.5m long (yes eight
and a half metres) and the pitched roof will be 4.5m above the level of
our garden (our garden is slightly lower than the neighbours as we are
downhill from them).

As such we are likely to lose the light much earlier than previously
and also our already dingy dining room and kitchen will require
artificial lighting on all but the brightest of days.

We were given the opportunity to raise these issues with a surveyor
(who has subsequently turned out to be the surveyor also used by the
council, so impartiality is in question). And his 'report' which the
council have paid =A3500+VAT for essentially is a few pictures of the
tatty 'lean-to' on the rear of our house commenting it is in poor
repair with no mention of the likely loss of light and almost
inevitably value to our property.

We can renovate or remove the lean-to but we cannot knock our
neighbours extension down to sell our house.

We have no particular objection to the extension itself, we have been
good neighbours and know they have been waiting a long time for the
extra space and facilities for their disabled son. However we do feel
that there should be some recompense for the potential loss in value to
our property. I have written back to the surveyor and asked him to
address the issues he was originally asked to look into.

Has anyone experienced a similar situation to this?

I have scanned the proposed plans and uploaded the two images to
http://www.vitae-services.co.uk/images/Extension.bmp and
http://www.vitae-services.co.uk/images/Elevations.bmp respectively.
These are big images (5000x2500 ish) but they are only about 700kb
each.

Regards,
Trojan.