A homeowner has been ordered the tear down an 'alien' fence after she moved it just a few feet.
Elaine Smedley, who lives in Letham Mains in Haddington, East Lothian, had no idea that moving the fence at the side of her new home would need planning permission.
However council bosses have ruled the wooden fence to be out of place and in breach of its open garden policy, Edinburgh Live reports.
East Lothian Council was alerted to the change and their officers classed it as a high front garden fence – which is banned.
Elaine is now battling an enforcement order from the council demanding she take the wooden fence down.
She said: “It seems very unjust, the fence is at the side of the house and it seemed to make sense to move it forward.
“The house across the road has a wall as high and that was given the go ahead.”
Elaine changed the 1.8 metre fence forward after discovering it ran parallel to the house between her property and her neighbours, splitting her side garden into two parts.
She claims it made sense to move it forward a few feet to enclose the entire side garden - and that it mirrors a number of other properties on the site where high walls and fencing is in place.
However, after the council was told about the change, officers ordered her to apply for planning permission which they then refused ruling the fence was ‘alien’ and looked out of place.
In a report by planning officers, they said the fence, and a side gate added to it, “appear alien and out of keeping with the largely low front roadside boundary enclosures of other houses of the development".
In the report, the officers acknowledge that the original 1.8 metre fence which encompassed the “side garden” was given planning permission, describing the strip of garden between the fence and a boundary wall a few feet in front of it as a “another smaller area of garden to the north side of the house.”
When Elaine moved the fence forward to just behind the wall - creating a gate entrance at the side - officers ruled it was now a front garden fence, which breaches their rules.
Elaine has lodged an appeal with Scottish Ministers after the council pushed ahead with enforcement action to have the fence taken down.
