Buying a flat or house question:

We live near a race track which is noisy at weekends. Can we do anything about it?

posted in Buying a flat or house | 2 responses

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Good Lawyer Guide's response

Your best starting point is probably talk to the planners (ie the Planning Department at your local council). They may well have received other complaints about the race track. Almost certainly, the race track will have planning permission to be used as a race track, but it may be that its use has become more intensive in recent years. If so, you could argue that a new planning permission is needed to cover that more intensive use. In practice, you would probably need to get several neighbours together to argue the point with you, and so persuade the council to take action.

As an alternative to talking to the planners, you could talk to a lawyer about whether or not you have a claim for a ‘legal nuisance’. Basically, you as a property owner, can take action against another property owner if their use of their land causes disruption to your use of your land. If the race track is particularly noisy then you might well have the basis of a ‘nuisance’ claim (although, once again, you will be better to band together with other neighbours and act collectively. Cases of that sort are difficult, however. One point to bear in mind is that it all boils down to what the court decides is ‘reasonable’. For instance, having a group of noisy cocks that make a noise early every morning may be reasonable in the country, but would not be reasonable in the city.

Jon Payne

Jon Payne's response

As one more alternative, you can also talk to the Council's Environmental Health Department. They have various powers that they can use to require the noise to be reduced if it is excessive and no reasonable steps are being taken to reduce it. The chances are that they will ask you to keep a diary of when you are being disturbed and how badly.

This has some advantages as their service is free and they can form an impartial assessment for you. If they decide to take action then you do not have to pay any of the legal costs. Even if you ask the Council to investigate, you can still take your own case at the same time if you feel that the process is taking too long.