How convenient: a garage mils away!

FURTHER to your article 'Dismay after residents lose their garages' (Journal, January 8), the actual number of garages due for demolition is 24, with five having gone already.

Given the impression that the car is one of the necessities of life, there does not appear to be an indication of replacement.

In the block of 13 where we are tenants of one, the amenities offered are one street lamp - which is almost completely surrounded by trees and consequently rendered useless.

These trees and bushes, which we have had to trim regularly to enable us to get a reasonable entry to the garage and the approach to them, had to be kept clear to avoid damage to the car top and bottom by grass weeds and brambles.

When I inquired of the people who were cutting the grass in Normanshurst Close why they did not do it, I was told that it was not on their map and that tends to sum up the attention these garages have received for most of their 35 years!

The maintenance inspection in which the so-called dangerous condition was found stemmed from a visit after a phone call (one of several) about a leak in the roof where it had not been sealed properly when they were constructed, which meant that the tops of the walls were soaked each time it rained - which hastened the corrosion of the reinforcement roads, which in turn cracked off some pieces of cement.

The times complaints were made to Waveney District Council about this problem achieved exactly nothing and it is amazing that the doors of three of the garages, which had paint burnt off when a car was torched in front of them ten years ago, have still never been repainted.

Several requests have been made for a garage, which have been refused because none were available - when we all knew that there were some that were not being used.

My wife and I were accompanied by a council official to visit a garage about three quarters of a mile away in Larch Road, where they then discovered it had been sold.

Not only do they fall down on maintenance, there seems to be room for improvement in the records department.

We were then offered a garage in Britten Road, south Lowestoft, which is about two and a half miles away. We felt lucky that they were not really concerned or we would have finished up in Kessingland.

When we queried the distance we were told that it was a mistake, but we have since heard from a previous tenant of one that has already been demolished that they also had the same offer!

F ROBINSON

NORMANSHURST CLOSE

LOWESTOFT