Seventeen Windows

[Miss Marple]

Or know people 

[Mike in Marple]

Some people have all the luck

Or the foresight to see a good oppurtunity and the skill to negotiate a good deal.

[sooty2]

Ken Harrop is supposed to have told Cllr Alexander £100.000 in exchange for land and Beverly Hills £27.000.which is it to be? Things still dont add up. Could an honest person give us an honest answer? Whats done is done, but the true cost of this project should be published for all to see. Come on you councillors and Ken Harrop, get your heads together, stories straight and less cooking and fudging!

[sooty2]

So it seems now that the owner of Seventeen windows has given his land away FREE!!!  How kind of him and how nice of the Highways Dept to give him a new garden costing £ 27000 and vehicular access to the property. Probably an increase on the property value £100.000 just for the garden and access. Properties with no access usually end up being sold at auction, just like the cottage in Brabyns Park. £27000? the amount of manpower on Seventeen Windows makes me wonder if those men were working for £1.00 per hour, Send them round to my place !! Some people have all the luck

[Victor M]

I also cycle regularly through Dan Bank and although not ideal as the traffic usually isn't moving I don't find it that unsafe (I'll probably get knocked off now) and I think that the eventual changes will be of benefit to both cyclists and motorists, not sure though how pedestrians will take to cyclists sharing their space.

[nbt]

... will incorporate a cycling section, thus alleviating the impact that cyclist have on traffic traveling up Dan Bank and making it much safer for cyclists and pedestrians. ...

As a cyclist I avoid Dan Bank, I think it's much too dangerous / frsutrating. I don't like holding up traffic, but there isn;t always room for cars to pass safely. Despite this any try anway. Instead, I cycle up the old road to Marple Hall round the edge of the school. It means I have to lift my bike over one fence, which is not great hardship - might see if the council can open that up...

[Victor M]

Having now spoken with Ken Harrop I can now confirm that the new lights on Offerton Road have been designed so that they will not have any impact on the flow of traffic through the junction. The second set of lights on the Dooley lane junction won't be installed until the summer of 20011, at the same time that the pavement up to Hill Top Drive is widened and will incorporate a cycling section, thus alleviating the impact that cyclist have on traffic traveling up Dan Bank and making it much safer for cyclists and pedestrians. The second set of lights will have a green man phase but this will only be on demand, thus the impact on traffic will be minimised and only really occur on the start and finish of the school day at Marple Hall.
On top of this they are also hopefull that they will be able to extend the turn right lane at the bottom of Stockport Road that will alleviate some of the hold ups caused by traffic turning right from Marple towards Romiley.
When the newness of the work on Seventeen Windows has faded and the landscaping has matured I think all in all I am now in favour. We will have at last a stabilised road, safer routes for both pedestrians and cyclists, an improved flow of traffic through the junction and allowed Seventeen Windows to remain as a residential home instead of eventually becoming a ruin. With most of the work paid for out of a central government pot. It's just a pity that none of this was communicated in full in any of the newsletters. Anyway it just goes to show the power of this forum!

[Victor M]

Many thanks for posting the above detailed explanation. A question I would like to ask the councillors involves the 2 green man crossing that are being erected. Are the crossing signals going to be on demand, i.e. only come on when someone wants to cross the road or be a permanent feature, i.e. coming on at every light changing phase 24/7. If it is the latter has there been an impact statement done on the effect it will have on vehicle traffic using the two junctions.

Also is it council policy to try and improve the width of all pavements in the borough where this is possible as there are lots of pavements locally on very busy roads that are less than 0.9m wide?

I will contact Ken Harrop, who I have spoken to in the past and always found him very approachable and professional, and post what I find out.

[admin]

Miss Marple has now received the following briefing report via Cllr Alexander. There is also a pdf of the drawing for the full scheme including the new pedestrian crossing here: www.marple-uk.com/misc/2022-17GA-01.pdf

BRIEFING NOTE ON 17 WINDOWS PROPERTY MARPLE ROAD OFFERTON

• The scheme involves improving pedestrian facilities between the Offerton area of Shearwater Road estate and beyond with Marple and includes the walking route for pupils attending Marple Hall School. This has been an issue that has been raised over a number of years by both residents and members.
• The owner of 17 Windows approached the council over two years ago with a planning application to relocate the position of his vehicular driveway that accessed and egressed into the signal-controlled junction.
• To facilitate this new access that would not conflict with the signals there was a requirement to improve the sight lines at the new location.
• The existing footpath and the radius of the bend did not allow this requirement to be met.
• The existing footpath was narrow along the frontage to the property being between 0.9m and 1.2 metres wide placing pedestrians in close proximity to passing traffic.
• The existing signals do not at present have any pedestrian facilities.
  
• The property owner offered to dedicate to the council land on the frontage of the property such that the footpath width could be widened to a maximum of 3.2 metres. This also allowed for the sight line for the new access to be achieved as well as improving road safety both in relation to the existing vehicular access and the improvement for pedestrians.
• The relocation of the vehicular access has allowed a scheme to be designed to carry out a junction improvement at the Offerton Road/Marple Road junction that will incorporate red and green man crossing facilities. This work will be carried out as phase 2 of the scheme during the October half term.
• The area of land that the property owner has agreed to dedicate to the Council is 130 sq. metres over a frontage length of 65metres.
• Land required for junction improvements that has been in private ownership has, on a regular basis, been purchased by the Council either as CPO or through negotiation.
• In this case the owner has given the land to the Council free of charge. However, if it would have been necessary to negotiate a purchase of the land then a figure of £18,000 would be a realistic value based on similar recent acquisitions.
• If the land had been compulsory purchased this would have taken a number of years to conclude.
• Work carried out within the curtilage of the property has essentially been the removal of the existing soil banking and the stabilisation and regrading of the garden area together with a small amount of sapling replanting and replacing of the boundary hedge.
• The materials used in the reconstruction of the stone retaining wall i.e. brick wall to a height of 1.2 metres with brick piers and timber panel infill to a finished height of 1.8 metres have been agreed with the owner after consulting with the East Area Planning.
• The owner has erected fencing to the north and west boundaries of the property at his expense.
• The construction works to complete the frontage boundary wall that presently being carried out are due to be completed in the next ten days and the replacement hedge will be planted subsequently with broad leaf laurel agreed with the environment officer.
• The initial design work undertaken at the inception of the scheme showed that there were no practicable alternative measures that were feasible to address the safety elements of the scheme given the absence of alternative footpaths in the area.
• The cost of the work that has been undertaken within the curtilage of the property in stabilising the ground, regrading and replanting is £27,000.
• The overall cost of the scheme that includes the junction improvement at Offerton road is £200,000 of which £35,000 is a contribution from structural funds for the retaining wall and £23,000 is a contribution from an adjacent development on Offerton Road.
• The outcome of this scheme is that, together with width improvements to the footpath on Danbank, and the incorporation of red and green man facilities at the Dooley lane /Marple Road junction (that will be carried out as part of the stabilisation works currently being undertaken), minor improvements to the footpath from the end of the current work to the Dooley Lane/Marple Road junction and the junction improvement at Offerton Road, there will be a significant improvement to road safety for pedestrians especially schoolchildren using the route to and from Marple Hall School.
• Forward visibility for traffic on Marple road travelling towards Marple travelling through the junction will also be improved.
• Incidents of vehicles entering and egressing the property directly into the signalised junction and the safety issues that this would have raised with the use of green man crossing facilities have been addressed.

If there are any further issues relating to the scheme please contact Ken Harrop, Strategic Network Engineer, Traffic Services on 0161-474-4818                 

[Dave]

Perhaps the Council should have bought the house, landscaped it as now, and they may have made a profit on it. Not helped to line the pockets of the owner.

Maybe we can use this example to maybe put pressure on our surely embarrassed councillors to show the "profits" stockport could make in buying other properties that will go same way or worse if someone doesn't step in soon

This wacky thread is becoming even more unreal!  So instead of sticking to making our roads and pavements safe, the Council should now be spending our Council Taxes on property speculation!  Good grief......

[alan@marple]

With regards to the consideration of the suggested £100.000 in exchange for "gifting" the land for pavement use, would the district valuation officer have been consulted and would there be a potential capital gains tax liability, or will there be in the future?.

[Lisa Oldham]

unfortunately most people want to make profit from bargains!! If id have ever considered buying it then I d certainly expect a hefty return from the effort that it clearly required!
Maybe we can use this example to maybe put pressure on our surely embarrassed councillors to show the "profits" stockport could make in buying other properties that will go same way or worse if someone doesn't step in soon... Brabyns cottage springs to mind for me presumably failed to sell at auction? and of course the house next to memorial park.

[Miss Marple]

Yes ! welcome Beverly  you have had the guts to write what most of us already knew but were reluctant to share, well done!  Whilst most on the site talk about the house looking 'nice' and a welcome development you have hit the nail on the head by pointing out the financial issues of a scheme that will profit a private house owner.  I have also had information about the owner and have been informed that he is a property developer and intended to make a profit when he purchased it from the previous owner who through ill health could not continue the renovations.  Property owner or not he stands to make a huge amount of profit and I personally feel wherever the monies came from they were never intended to profit an individual.   

NB  My quote ARE YOU LOCALS comes from the league of gentlemen !!  not a personal attack on people ( KEEP IT REAL !!)

[Dave]

Hi Beverly - welcome to the Forum and to this long-running issue!

Re your objection to 'our Council Tax paying for it', if you read through some earlier posts you'll find copies of various communications from councillors and officers of SMBC which explain (sometimes rather confusingly) where the funding came from.  Basically it is mainly from a government 'pot' called SEMMS (South East Manchester Multi-Modal Strategy' - what a mouthful!).  It does not appear to have been funded from Council Tax. Although personally I wouldn't object if it was - I can't imagine anything more important than making pavements safe for pedestrians.

Re the pressure on the old retaining wall, if you look at the old photographs which are just a few posts back from this one, you'll see that there was a brick wall across the front of the property.  I would imagine that the problem was not immediately in front of the house, but in front of the old garden at the east (Marple) end.

[beverley hills]

This is my first contribution to the site on the Seventeen Windows debacle. Like most of the writers I to am very concerned about the funding that the Council have provided for this scheme. A few months ago I had a telephone conversation with Ken Harrop, Stratigic Network Engineer. The answer that I was provided with may be of interest to you all.
The council decided that the footpath required widening outside Seventeen Windows. In order for this to become a possibility the owner of Seventeen Windows was asked to and agreed to dedicate a narrow strip of land fronting the property. In exchange the Council would fund the landscaping to the tune of £100,000. This was to include the cost of stabilising the banking. It seems somewhat strange that nowhere on this site does this figure appear. There are figures detailing the total cost of the whole scheme £200,000, mention of contributions by the property owner, but no mention of the cost incurred on the landscaping. Perhaps they would rather us not know. I do not have a problem with the work that has been carried out, but I strongly object to our Council Tax paying for it. It is obvious that the owner will reap significant financial benefit. One final point, in respect of Ken Harrops e mail of a few days ago. He states that the boundary retaining wall had moved under pressure of the banking which was slipping. I have no recollection of there being a wall in front of the banking, only a hedge, and photos available on the web will confirm. My research has shown that the property owner is a Mr. Mollinson from Wilmslow and that the property was bought in 2007 for £138.000. Perhaps the Council should have bought the house, landscaped it as now, and they may have made a profit on it. Not helped to line the pockets of the owner.