Residents on one of Derbyshire’s newest housing estates are furious that it is incomplete almost three years after they moved in. The Highfields estate in Littleover is littered with unfinished roads, dumped building equipment and open manhole covers, despite more than 800 families calling the area home.
One resident, Christopher Harris says that he has had to re-turf his garden three times due to poor drainage at his new build three-bedroom semi-detached home on the estate. Mr Harris, who is a health and safety manager, bought the property from Miller Homes for £219,000 in 2019 and says that the estate is full of issues.
He told Derbyshire Live that “the estate looks like it has been there for 25 years, not three”. Derbyshire Live went to visit the Highfields estate and Mr Harris and witnessed building materials dumped in streams, weeds growing out of pavements and broken fences.
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Mr Harris said the roads are so bad he has broken a spring on his car and he says there are at least seven other people that have broken springs on the speed bumps that “don’t need to be there anymore”.
He said: There’s rubbish and stuff around the back of our house where this tree line finishes. The fields, when it rains, overflows and floods and comes all the way around the back of here.
“There’s so much stuff wrong with this estate, you’ve got roads, which aren’t to the standard because they’ve got breaks in the Tarmac.”
Other residents are frustrated at the current condition of the estate, which has 882 homes. One claimed: “We have drains which are all blocked, pavements that look like a patchwork quilt and a rat problem. It’s disgusting.”
Another resident said: “The road conditions are so dangerous. Me and my sister hit a pothole going slowly. The airbags deployed and the corner of the drain ripped the bottom of the car off.”
Since he moved in, Mr Harris says that he has been trying to purchase the grass outside his home which he says is regularly walked on by passing dog walkers and maintenance workers who are able to peer directly into his kitchen. Mr Harris assumed Miller Homes would be able to sell him the land.
To add insult to injury, the 882 households on the Highfields estate are now being asked to pay more than £142,000 a year between them to maintain the area’s green spaces by Greenbelt, a company specialising in the maintenance of green spaces. Mr Harris says that this includes the grass outside his front door.
However, Miller Homes says that its management of the site is to be transferred to the maintenance company, Greenbelt, and so Mr Harris would need to purchase the land from it. Greenbelt has told Mr Harris that the land outside his house is still owned by the developer (Miller Homes) and cannot help him.
Miller Homes, which is not the only housebuilder which developed the site, told Derbyshire Live that: “The roads are a joint responsibility of the consortium partners and are in the same condition across the site – they will be upgraded over the coming months in order to be adopted by the local highway authority.
“Highfields was originally designed in line with the local authority planners to feature lots of public open spaces and this is replicated across the development, which has been delivered by a consortium of housebuilders, namely ourselves, Barratt and Taylor Wimpey.
“At the time of purchase, it is made clear to all prospective owners the area that sits within their individual property title, as well as the managed areas. The piece of land in question falls under public open space of which there are many like this throughout the development. It is not within our gift to be able to sell these spaces and our responsibility for these areas will be handed over shortly to Greenbelt, who have been appointed by the consortium to manage the public areas on behalf of the Highfields community.”
A spokesperson from Greenbelt told Derbyshire Live: “None of the area is managed by Greenbelt and will not be managed by us at any time in the future. The roads, pavements, gullies, grass verges and the metal protected trees are all within white areas on the site plan, all Sustainable Urban Drainage Systems aspects are light green on the plan – meaning they are with the developer (Miller Homes).
“Our customers are, therefore, not being charged for any of these areas. We held pre-billing meetings over two nights, attended by local parish councillors who live on the development, and attendees were quite understanding of what is planned in terms of accessing areas we do maintain.
“There are various types of grass, including amenity and meadow, trees including mature, shrubs, woodlands that are semi-mature and young, a play area, paths with hard and soft surfaces, fences and bins. There are 882 houses billed at £3.11 a week: this covers approximately 40% of the development and is shown on the plan in brown.
“Prior to billing, we also met with members of the planning department and the lead developer to look at all of the areas we were to access. The local tree officer was also in attendance and all parties discussed the areas shown in dark green on our site plan (phase 1 access areas).
“Not only did they agree those areas were as per the plan and ready for access, but they were also very happy with work completed so far to bring these up to standard and the proactive role we are taking in helping this process along.”
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