It went on to state that it was “good practice to be neighbourly” and said if he did not take down the chimes he could be prosecuted under the Environmental Protection Act. However, a defiant Mr Littlechild has so far refused to budge, and after two further letters - and a visit from council workers who were sent to listen to the chimes – he now faces a possible court hearing and a potential £5,000 fine.
He said: “I seriously thought it was a joke at first. How can the council think that spending the taxpayers’ money on this is OK? When two men from the council did turn up and I showed them the wind chimes, I could tell they were trying to suppress a giggle over how ridiculous it all is. I feel like I’m being bullied by the council over the most timid of things.”
A spokesman for the council said: "There have been council officers out to measure the noise from the house next door and the wind chimes do breach appropriate noise levels. We are not yet at the stage where Mr Littlechild will have to go to court as we have not yet sent him an abatement notice, only warning letters. If we decide to send an abatement notice and Mr Littlechild ignores it that is when we would decide whether to take the matter to court or not."
4 comments:
Many people fail to understand that wind-chimes are supposed to be hung INSIDE the window, for their own personal pleasure. I really hate being kept awake by the sound of scrap metal or wood clattering in neighbours' gardens. Selfish, selfish, selfish...
The usual Daily Mail style argument that it's a waste of tax payers' money. Does he not realize that he's the one wasting tax payers' money by refusing to comply with the request.
Quite frankly I think he's being a selfish knob for not taking them down if they're disturbing his neighbours' sleep. Those things can be fairly noisy, and nobody likes being subjected to an unwanted noise at night.
They do not have to be there and wait for the wind to blow in order to measure the noise level, they can simply buy a similar device and reproduce the noise in controlled environment, measure it and I am sure it will be above acceptable levels. Moreover, if Mr. Littlechild thinks it’s not a big deal, they why create such problem, just remove it… it’s not a big deal for you, right? Once, you do, everybody will leave you alone.
And finally… if you don’t let a man sleep one, two, three nights… eventually that man will want to take a gun and blow your head off… and that desire would be normal. That’s how much of “joke” it is, as he puts it, for those who are awaken every night by the artificial noise.
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