Landowner ‘in ruins’ as council closes site (From South Wales Guardian)

Landowner ‘in ruins’ as council closes site

7:00am Wednesday 6th March 2013 in News

AN AMMANFORD landowner who says he has spent £54,000 clearing up an old opencast site is on a collision course with Carmarthenshire county council.

Angry Wyn Davies is resigned to being prosecuted by the local authority who have issued two planning enforcement notices on the Shands Road site which expire tomorrow (Thursday).

“The bloody council have ruined me,” he told the Guardian.

The local authority has ordered the removal of “several unauthorised buildings and sited touring and static caravans that have been used residentially on the land”, storage containers, all motorised vehicles and the demolition of wooden and metal-sheeted buidlings.

Mr Davies, 52, maintains he has transformed the land into a camping and fishing site for local youngsters. “The council said I couldn’t have planning because this is countryside,”

he said. “What they forget is that I’m the one who’s made it into countryside.”

The dispute started when Mr Davies’s application for a house at the site was turned down in February 2010. His subsequent appeal to the Welsh Government was dismissed.

“I bought this land five years ago to create something for the kids, because this is something I never had myself as a youngster,” he said.

“We’ve kept animals up here and provided fishing and camping – we had 120 kids up here one weekend.

“Over seven months I filled in four lagoons for safety reasons, spent a whole day clearing Shands Road of caravan interiors, crockery, broken glass and tons and tons of rubbish and repaired the banks of the River Loughor.

“The council say I’m living here yet they sent the enforcement notice to my house which is just over half-a-mile away from this site.”

Kevin Jones, a county council enforcement officer, said: “Mr Davies has confirmed that he will adhere to the requests of the notice and will ring me to meet him on site when the notice compliance date expires on March 7.”