PLANS to bring a dilapidated barn into residential use have been approved by Carmarthenshire County Council.

The barn is on Plas Farm, Penygarn Road, Tycroes, Ammanford, and the application was submitted to Carmarthenshire County Council by Mr D Fuge.

The disused former agricultural barn is in a poor condition and the plan is to restore the barn and turn it into residential accommodation.

The building is a single-storey traditional stone-built building which is believed to have been built around 1800.

It has a cut timber trussed pitched roof and soft verges line the base of the walls on three of the four elevations.

A structural survey was carried out in May which found loose stonework in the walls and some open joints were found. None of the work carried out suggested any structural failure but there were no intrusive investigations so further investigative work would be needed to ensure the full structural safety before any works begin.

The roof structure appeared sound and the architects who examined it stated that the building is suitable for conversion without any major reconstruction work.

The corrugated sheeting on the roof will be removed as will the concrete floor slab, timber roof structure and the timber wall plate.

The timber wall plate was found to have ‘completely perished’ and the timber roof structure’s wood was found to be in a relatively good condition, and could be reused to keep some of the original character of the building.

In the plans, the stone walls will be kept as much as possible and the tin sheet roof will be replaced with a slate roof to match the existing main house.

The windows and doors will be made of UPVC.

On October 5, Carmarthenshire County Council approved the plans with five conditions including the work must be started within five years of the approval date and must be done in line with the approved plans. Another condition is that the annexe must only be used ancillary to the residential use of Plas Farm and cannot be occupied by anyone who is not related to occupants of the main building. There is also a condition that enhancements relating to bats must be put in place prior to the occupation of the annexe and the materials used must match the existing building.