Families living on Millionaire’s Row angered author PG Wodehouse over ‘ugly’ new home

Millionaire’s Row families who inspired author PG Wodehouse are furious over a huge new house allegedly built in breach of planning permission.

Earlier this year, angry residents were warned to stop bombarding parish councilors with abusive phone calls about an ‘ugly’ development on Wodehouse Road, in the leafy Norfolk seaside village of Old Hunstanton.

Now the owners of The White Cottage, previously run as a seaside guest house, are seeking retrospective planning permission for the new three-storey building they have built on the site.

At a planning meeting on December 2, councilors are recommended by planning officers to vote ‘yes’, despite a barrage of fresh objections from the other householders and the parish council.

Houses on Wodehouse Road often change hands for more than a million pounds.

Its namesake – Jeeves maker PG Wodehouse – was a regular visitor to the village in the 1920s and 1930s, staying at Hunstanton Hall, home of his friend Charles le Strange, in the 1920s.

Hall itself is set in its own parkland and further up the driveway is The Clock Tower, a Grade II listed water coach house dating from 1876, which last sold for £1.7 million.

The current row began in 2022 when construction began on a house on Wodehouse Road, not far from the beach, on the site of the previous cottage, which was demolished.

Families living in Millionaire’s Row, inspired by PG Wodehouse, are furious about a new house on their street

They claim the property was built in breach of planning permission and complained it was a three-storey house instead of two. (Image: construction drawings)

Villagers complained that it had been built as a three-storey house, rather than two-storey as they believed it should have been, and bombarded West Norfolk Council with objections that it was ‘too big and high’.

The parish council is also against it, claiming there may have been breaches of the original planning permission.

One objection from the parish council stated: ‘The breaches have led to the existence of a building that appears too large and too high for the plot and the surrounding properties and which directly affects the light and privacy of the immediate neighbors and is seen as ugly within the local neighborhood in general.’

The owners have been pursuing the application through agents and have so far only been identified in the planning documents as Mr and Mrs H Middleton, from Lincolnshire.

The Middletons deny any breaches of planning conditions and say the property has always been approved as a three-storey house.

They only admit that ‘minor changes’ have been made to the balcony and windows, as well as to an additional basement room.

The building is located on the west side of Hamilton Road, at the junction with Wodehouse Road in Old Hunstanton.

The site is within the Old Hunstanton development boundary and outside the Old Hunstanton Conservation Area, and also outside the Norfolk Coast National Landscape.

The Middletons are seeking retroactive permission to change the original plans for the development approved in 2023. The cottage has already been razed and the replacement building is largely completed.

The application has provoked further backlash from residents, but planner Connor Smalls is recommending approval.

The parish council is also against it, claiming there may have been breaches of the original planning permission

Mr Smalls said: ‘Contrary to the objections raised, the original approved application was always for a three-storey building: lower ground level (partially submerged), ground floor and first floor. The addition of the downstairs room takes advantage of an existing empty space that already existed as part of the house’s foundation.

‘This has not resulted in any additional excavation work, has not resulted in any changes to the structural configuration of the home and has made no difference to the appearance of the entire property.

‘Due to the partially submerged nature of this room, there is no view of adjacent buildings.’

But Old Hunstanton Parish Council objects: ‘Local residents and neighbors are objecting, and the planning enforcement officer should encourage the applicant to stick to the initially agreed plans, particularly for a two-storey building rather than a three-storey building floors, which is visited on site. indicates that this is so, and in general.’

Locals claim that attempts to downplay the development involved little more than planting plants to screen it.

Neighbor Dawn Brooke objected: ‘The barbecue area is not very high at the side, which shows how they can see straight over it to our kitchen window, the side door, along the passage and into the rear garden. Plants are not the solution.

‘To make matters worse, after trying everything the council refused, their answer is to just cover it with plants. But they still have a three-story retrospective house, which is incredible.”

Locals also claim that the house built in 2023 is even bigger than the house that was rejected last year because it was too big.

Objector Michael Oldham added: ‘A culture of non-compliance and disregard for planning regulations/laws has hung over White Cottage since the initial application was rejected in 2022 on several grounds including its size.

‘The building constructed in 2023/2024, which includes large parts of the unapproved development, may prove to be a larger building than the rejected proposal in 2022.’