Closed hotel faces £5k bill to clear dumped cars
A HOTEL company has been left with 27 derelict cars, a compliance notice and a £5,000 bill, after vehicles were dumped on its land.
St Margaret’s Lodge, which in recent years had been rebranded as Forest Park, closed four years ago. Since then the car park on the site on Forest Road has been used for dumping vehicles.
Now the planners have had enough and have issued St Margaret’s Hotel Ltd director Carlo Stefani with a compliance notice, ordering that all vehicles and vehicle parts, which are unconnected with the tourist industry, are removed.
But Mr Stefani said he would also be more than happy to see the vehicles gone.
‘The vehicles are just abandoned there,’ he said. ‘Left overnight without number plates.
‘People have also been putting rubbish over the wall. And the authorities have not been very helpful.’
He said he had found a man who had offered to remove the vehicles. However instead he had removed parts of the cars and used a fork lift to stack some of the vehicle shells at the end of the car park.
Then he left the island, with 27 cars or parts of cars left behind.
‘I trusted him as he had a local partner,’ Mr Stefani said.
‘He was doing a job and he looked quite professional.’
Mr Stefani said he had now found an alternative, with up to six cars going each week. But the total cost to clear it would be £5,000 and Mr Stefani said he was trying to spread the cost out.
He said he was as keen as the planners to see the vehicles gone, but it would take time.
A gate with a padlock has now been installed on the entrance to stop further dumping.
Mr Stefani said he had also had to make warning signs due to the amount of broken glass and the stacked vehicles, which would be a danger to trespassers.
The compliance notice states that the vehicles must be removed by 24 June.
