Not stumped yet

I didn't really take anything specifically for a Blip today. I've been chasing up the council about their planning department agreeing to an application to build a house in TPO woodland. For those who don't recognise the initials, TPO stands for Tree Preservation Order which means that the owner of the tree mustn't do anything with it without the permission of the council.

In this case the applicant was turned down as the whole woodland had TPO designation, but then appealed against the decision which was overturned 'as long as they didn't cut down more than 5% of the trees'.

We, Keep Oban Beautiful that is, are trying to stop this destruction because as far as we know a bat survey has not been carried out and an email to the council this morning tried to fudge the issue. We will see.

Anyway, this is where permission has been granted to build a house. A very bad precedent, I think.