New anger over Whitehouse tower

FURIOUS residents in Bramford have started a campaign to prevent extra stories being added to a building they say is already a monstrous eyesore.

They claim Landmark House, previously the Agilent building, on White House Road in Ipswich towers over the village and that the situation will get even worse if planning permission is granted to extend it.

Shirley Oxborrow, 63, who lives on Mill Field, has started a petition and is already finding the majority of people oppose the development.

She said: “The horrid building has upset everyone since it was put up.

“I can see it from every room in my house so this monstrous looking thing follows me wherever I go and it is going to get worse now.

“What if I want to sell my house, who will want to buy it?”

Fellow villager Beryl Simms, 59, of Mill Lane, was also determined that the building, which was first built by Agilent in the late 1990s but has never been fully occupied, should not be extended.

She said: “Bramford is a rural community and we are surrounded by beautiful countryside, but then you get this building.

“But we weren't consulted when it first went up because although it dominates our skyline it is not in the parish of Bramford.

“We really have no control over what looks over our village.”

But the chairman of Bramford Parish Council, David Bailey, promised that although the council had not been consulted during the original planning proposal it would make its voice heard in the current planning debate.

He said: “This new addition will only make a bad situation worse because it will increase the building's dominance which is bad for our environment.

“But this time Ipswich council has approached us so we will be discussing the proposals at our parish council meeting on Monday .”

Both Ipswich council and Landmark Properties, the company which has applied for planning permission, declined to comment.