Inbox The complaint made to Cuckoo as written on their own page Dear all, Please allow me to write an alternative view, from someone who is close to this and indeed has personal experience to draw upon. But first let me ask a question, do you have a one year old baby? If you don’t, but have children, I’m sure you can cast your mind back to how that feels. Even if you don’t have children, I’m sure you can understand the importance of their wellbeing to parents. The reason I ask this question is that there is currently, probably as you read this, a one year old baby breathing in a large amount of black carbon fumes coming from a pizza oven within ten feet of the house. But let me start at the beginning. There are a number of local residents who were living in Prestwich long before Cuckoo resided. Who were actually very excited about having Cuckoo regenerate the high street. So when a letter came through from Bury Council detailing a planning application, being so close to the property, we were understandably intrigued. And pleasantly surprised when the owners got in touch asking for a meeting to hopefully allay any concerns we would have, during which time we could make objections to the Council if we so wished. So a number of residents sat down with the owner and asked a number of questions, and received very positive answers. All residents that attended that meeting have the same view of what was stated to this day. Below is a list of things that were stated by the owners of the café during that meeting: At no point would hot food be served throughout the café at any time At no point would any serving take place in the terrace area Windows and the terrace door would be closed at an agreed time to keep noise within the property People would be encouraged to smoke at the front of the property People would be inside the property at an agreed time No access would be needed to the residents private garden area unless in absolute emergencies As stated, there are a number of people who can vouch for this. Nearly 18 months later, and each of these promises have been broken. The residents concerned started off as very supportive customers and would be spending money in Cuckoo every week. And were overlooking the disregard of certain agreements such as keeping windows closed and asking people to keep inside within the agreed licensing times. But then a pizza oven appeared in the terrace area, without any warning or consultation to residents or council planning approval being granted. And the smoke we residents have to put up with coming from that oven and into our properties is harmful and disgusting. And after mentioning this to the owners, their words of advice: ‘keep your windows closed.’ How would you personally feel if someone dictated to you, in the height of summer, that you could not open your windows in your own home? But it didn’t stop there. Completely out of the blue, again, without once being asked or my door being knocked on, we received a threatening solicitor’s letter demanding they have access at all times to our private back garden, when they had previously agreed this would not be needed. Not only that, for the purpose of a waste removal truck removing rubbish via our back garden every week. Once again, please put yourself in our shoes. This is also not to mention the threatening and aggressive confrontations residents have had with the owners and aggressive text messages received. There are indeed two elderly residents further down the street that are also particularly affected by the pizza oven but feel too scared and intimidated to go into the café, so have written a letter to the owners, but have not received a response. I would also like to clarify a point made about how there is no nuisance or disturbance from the residents of the bar. This is what we as neighbours have had to put up with so far: People scaling the gate on numerous occasions and being in our back garden, a clear security threat People urinating against our cars Smashed bottles in our back garden Hundreds of cigarettes dropped in our back garden A rat infestation because of the waste And this is all on our own privately owned property. So there we are. I was quite happy keeping this debate between ourselves, the owners and the Council, but the owners have decided to make this public, personally insulting us on a public forum, which has led to some disgusting comments above, which we simply don’t deserve. And language quite frankly, people shouldn’t be exposed to on a public forum. And for those people that have called us those names, shame on you. I hope you don’t go through the same thing, and people are so quick to judge. So, I am not asking for your action, because I firmly believe everyone has a right to their opinion, and you can contact the Council if you wish, but please be assured that there are two sides to every story, and things are not as straight forward as you think. As this is not one person’s complaint. Far from it and it is completely naive to think that, and the number of people who have made complaints to the Council may well surprise you. All of which are local residents and were here long before Cuckoo. To end on, I would like to say there is not one resident that is asking for Cuckoo to be closed and have all made those feelings clear to the Council. I for one think it is a fantastic venue, it would just be nice to be considerate of its local residents and not to go back on promises that have been made. It is with regret that this wasn’t discussed privately with all residents, before solicitor’s letters have been sent. But this is the situation. And you can see by the reaction to comments above, the contempt that the owners have for local residents. This will be my only post, as I will not get involved in an argument on a public forum, not something I wanted anyway, but personal insults take it too far. And we deserve a voice. I’m sure this comment won’t go unnoticed and a response will be forthcoming, but please be assured, this is not just one complaint. Regards
Posted on: Fri, 12 Sep 2014 19:56:12 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015