Court action for failing to tidy Wharf site

FAILURE to tidy up a designated conservation area will see the landowner in court.

An enforcement notice was issued in February calling for work to remove the machinery, vehicles and other items littering the entrance to the Wharf off Coventry Road Hinckley.

Residents and ward councillors have been calling for action for years.

Despite the warning the site remains as jumbled as before and so the owner is being prosecuted.

Paperwork has been prepared and Hinckley and Bosworth Borough Council has been given a date for the case to be heard at Leicester Magistrates Court on October 25.

The length of the Ashby Canal, which runs through Hinckley and skirts the Wharf, has been classified a conservation area as it links to the town’s industrial heritage.

According to Hinckley and Bosworth Borough Council’s own planning guidelines, conservation area designation recognises the unique quality of an area as a whole.

Such areas are given special protection to ensure their character is preserved or enhanced.

Clarendon ward Lib Dem councillor David Bill who championed residents calls for a clean-up said: “The situation is much the same there now as it was in February.

“The landowner has had significant time to tidy the plot but has not done so and the council has been left with little choice but to seek legal redress.”