Planner is on a different planet

Jun 29 2008 by Ken Oxley, Sunday Sun

HAS planning inspector John Gray been overdosing on old episodes of Yes Minister?

The hit 1980s sit-com turned meaningless doublespeak into an art form . . . and it would appear Mr Gray could give the show’s biggest bullsh**er, Sir

Humphrey Appleby a run for his money.

This week Mr Gray hammered the final nail into the coffin of one of the North’s best-loved views — that of the River Tyne from the Free Trade Inn in Ouseburn, Newcastle — by giving the go-ahead to a 13-storey tower block.

He then had the audacity to tell those who objected to the plans that often views are “made more interesting, sometimes tantalising, when not all is immediately apparent to the eye.”

Excuse me? Is this guy for real? If that’s the case, why don’t we just stick a block of flats in front of the Angel of the North? And while we’re at it, let’s make better use of the spare land surrounding all those boring old Roman forts in Northumberland.

Then there’s the Lake District . . . all that scenery and not a skyscraper in sight. What a waste!

Newcastle City Council had denied planning permission to the luxury homes.

And more than 1300 people signed a petition objecting to it. Many of the city’s councillors and businesses were also against the scheme.

But Mr Gray, who is employed by the Planning Inspectorate, an independent body which rules on development disputes, saw fit to sweep their concerns aside.

And then, as if to rub salt in their wounds, he spouts a load of patronising claptrap about partially obscured “tantalising” views by way of justification.

I’d like to know where Mr Gray comes from, whether he’s a native of the North East and if he’s ever looked out over the marvellous vista from the Free Trade Inn.

But when I asked the Planning Inspectorate, they refused to release any information about the man who, in the eyes of many, has rubber-stamped an act of corporate vandalism.

And for what? Yet another characterless, vertical slab of a building crammed with posh bachelor pads that no one wants. No one except greedy property developers, that is.

There are already more than enough of these luxury flats along the banks of the Tyne, many of them empty.

The company behind this latest development, Taylor Wimpey, clearly believes the 89 flats it plans to build will be snapped up by speculators, who will simply sit on their investment until the market picks up.

Whether they will actually provide much-needed homes for anyone does not seem to matter to them.

And neither, it would appear, do the opinions of local people.