A DISPUTE over vehicle access to a house on a country lane that has been closed since the turn of the century has been resolved.

Melanie Lindsell asked her local authority to issue a certificate confirming the historical vehicle access to her house is lawful after she replaced metal gates or railings that had been placed across the entrance with oak gates.

The application for the certificate of lawful development was made following a planning application, by Ms Lindsell, which asked for retrospective permission for the wooden gates.

The application, which was made in December 2023 and still hasn’t been decided also sought permission for a loft conversion and an upper floor gable extension to the home known as Well House which is on Well House Lane in the countryside at Whitelye, near Trellech.

That prompted a neighbour to object to the plans for the access, which included retaining the wooden gates, as they claimed it created a new access and provided Google Earth images, dating from 2011, which showed the metal gates the objector described as “railings”.

The local Trellech Community Council also objected to the garden wall, alongside the gates, as it claimed it had encroached on adjacent land.

Monmouthshire County Council’s planning department has granted the certificate confirming the access through the wooden gates is lawful.

It said it has no evidence to show the access had been “abandoned” and Ms Lindsell had shown “on the balance of probabilities” it hadn’t been abandoned and as a result is lawful.

As part of the application process she had provided two signed affidavits confirming the entrance was the original access before an additional piece of land was purchased and used for access.

It was also shown the metal railings could be removed to allow for access for vehicles.

Planning officer Ryan Bentley said in a report: “The signed affidavits are comprehensive evidence that, on the balance of probabilities, there was an historic access at the site. This evidence states that between the years of 1958 and 1999, this was the original access to the property.”