Mother Sophie Daly had sought permission to keep the fence
Jonathon Hill News reporter, Benjamin Blosse and Twm Owen
08:41, 08 Nov 2025
The fence will have to be taken down(Image: Local Democracy Reporting Service)
A family has been told to take down a timber fence separating their front garden from a main road after their application to keep it was rejected.
Mother Sophie Daly had sought permission to retain the fence, which reaches 1.98m at its tallest point and exceeds the height of a “dwarf wall”, along with a garden gate she said “enhancing safety and security” for her child and the family’s large breed dog.
She argued it provided superior protection from noise and pollution generated by the busy A48 near her home in Chepstow, Wales, compared to the hedge it had replaced, for the detached two-storey property.
The fence was put up at the St Lawrence Road home between February and April this year, with Ms Daly submitting a retrospective application in August.
Her application received support from Paul Pavia, the Conservative councillor for the town’s Mount Pleasant ward, Chepstow Town Council, and the only neighbour who responded to Monmouthshire County Council’s planning department, describing themselves as a resident who “they enjoy seeing the new well-kept addition” and calling the fence “modern but respectable”, reports Wales Online.
However, council planners took a different view, stating that given the “prominent location” at an entrance to the town, the gate and fence “cause unacceptable harm to the visual amenity and open character of the area”, leading them to recommend refusal. Planning officer Philip Thomas pointed out that the property is situated at a “visually prominent entrance to Chepstow”.
The planning committee members agreed and rejected the application, although three councillors opposed the refusal recommendation and one abstained.
How the house looked with the hedge that has been replaced by the timber fence(Image: Local Democracy Reporting Service)
Rachel Buckler, a Conservative councillor for Devauden, recognised the concerns raised but stated: “I do think it is detrimental and not in keeping and to my mind the hedge was better.”
Emma Bryn, an Independent member for Wyesham, voiced her concern that approving the fence could “set a precedent” with “a really negative effect on the environment of Chepstow”.
Cllr Pavia reminded the committee that neither the council’s highways department nor the Welsh Government, which oversees the A48, had objected, and argued that the fence offered “protection from one of Chepstow’s busiest roads”.
He added: “It is very near the infamous Highbeech roundabout. It is not a rural lane but a noisy, polluted urban corridor.”
The committee was also advised to reject the application due to insufficient “appropriate ecological mitigation or compensation” for the removed hedge.
Ms Dally’s application proposed providing a bird box and a “bug hotel” in the front garden.
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