By Brian Allison, local government reporter

UNAUTHORISED work in a Victorian listed building in Whitehall Crescent was described as wanton vandalism at the city council’s development quality committee meeting last night.

The committee was considering an application for listed building permission by Mr I Jamal to install services, including gas and electricity, at Numbers 12 and 18 Whitehall Crescent, although some of the work has already been done.

In unanimously refusing listed building permission the committee sought to send out a clear signal to developers and contractors that such practices were not acceptable.

In a report, planning and transportation director Mike Galloway said permission was being sought to install services in the properties’ communal closes for new flats.

“A significant amount of these works have been completed and are evident on both the ground and first floor levels of the properties,” he said.

“These unauthorised works include, amongst other things, significant pipe work associated with a new sprinkler system, gas pipes and a new electricity box and associated cables.”

Mr Galloway said permission was also sought for a new doorway at the first floor level of No 12, which has already been formed.

He said the council had been alerted to the work in August and the impact on the stairwell was of such concern the applicants were instructed to cease immediately until the damage had been fully assessed by the council and Historic Scotland.

“Subsequent follow-up visits to the site revealed that this advice was not heeded and additional works within the stairwells had been carried out,” Mr Galloway said.

Recommending refusal, the director said the application had attracted eight letters of objection and a petition with 67 signatures.

Representatives of residents in the building called the unauthorised work “indescribable, wanton destruction” which had “ripped the heart out of an irreplaceable Victorian building.”

Planning consultant Joseph Dagen, for the applicant, accepted the services installed were “pretty intrusive”.

He said it was possible the services could be re-routed to take them out of the stairwell altogether and restoration work carried out.

He asked for a month’s deferral to allow a solution to be reached.

Councillor Fraser Macpherson, in whose ward the building lies, moved refusal not only on the grounds of the work on installing services, as recommended by the director, but also relating to the new doorway.

“If we don’t include that as a reason for refusal, then wanton vandalism of this stairwell will have been allowed by this committee,” he said. “The clearest of signals must be sent out by this committee in relation to this sort of activity.”

The committee unanimously approved Mr Macpherson’s motion.

* An application for a new house in Gibson Terrace was deferred last night because of a problem with bats.

An objector to a proposal to build a two-storey home and garage at the end of the street suggested there was a colony of bats roosting in nearby trees and it was feared construction traffic might disturb them. The committee decided to conduct inquiries into whether there was a colony, in case the presence of the protected animals scuppered the planning process.