I HAVE A CHANCE TO DEVELOP AND DRASTICALLY IMPROVE IT .
The reality of what actually happened…..
He stopped locals walking up there , built two houses up there , builders waste was then dumped in the Lake until it was almost completely filled in.
I am NOT a Fisherman but would like to Conserve Arlesey as it is. I am a member of the Arlesey Town Council Archive Group but I am not speaking for them.My gran and grandad were walking round the lake from 1937 when they first moved from the Brickyard foremans house to 2, St Peters Ave.They took me up their as a 4 year old in 1956. My son went round there until he was a teenager in the late 1980’s. So my family walked round the lake from 1937-1987 , 50 years.
Three members of our Allen family Ron , Mick ,and Jim , and Richard and Ann Francis playing up the Lake.
Twenty Years Ago on 4th March 1994 an article was printed in the BIGGLESWADE CHRONICLE with a photo of the Etonbury Farm Conservation Area sign. The fishermen were concerned the Lake was being destroyed forever.
The 8 Acre Arlesey Lake was one of Fishermans most historic waters.
ex Arlesey Councillor David Beatham even put up this sign Etonbury Farm Conservation Landfill Site
The late record breaking local fisherman Dick Walker patented the Arlesey Bomb here , and this was a huge step forward for the sport.
Many fishermen look on it as a bit of a shrine to Dick Walker.
Beds County Council gave the owner David Beatham Planning Permision to partial fill in the Lake in1989. Work started in 1991 and by 1994 when finished half a million cubic metres of builders debri will have been tipped into it , allegedly to make it shallower and better for the spawning of the fish. Dumping all that rubbish in there though was killing the fish. Conservation Area Sign?the fish were being killed.
The owner David Beatham said he had done nothing wrong and has only the future of the Lake at heart. He said he had taken advice from the RSPB and Anglia Water and wanted to improve it and turn it into a much more natural Lake.
He went on to say the fish and the environment will benefit.
I hear there is no fishing up there now and its only about 4 feet deep , and people have been stopped from walking around there.
Strange I have another Biggleswade Chronicle article dated 21 October 1994 which says he only had permission to dump 300,000 cubic metres of harmless waste. By the time councillor Beatham’s permit ran out he had only dumped 250,000 cubic metres.
The fishermen protested and lobbied Mid Beds County council not to extend his permit but they lost and he was given permission to dump another 100,000 cubic metres.
That was a huge blow to the fishermen across the UK.
The dumping scheme allegedly had the support of RSPB , Anglia Water , and Mid Beds County Council. For what that was worth , in my opinion clauses should have been put into the agreement.
A farmer is facing the prospect of demolishing a house he built without planning permission.
This week Wheelform Properties’ directors Mr and Mrs David Beatham of Etonbury Farm, Stotfold Road, Arlesey, asked Mr Justice Cranston in the High Court to quash a Government planning inspector’s decision that his farm manager’s house must go.
Mr Beatham, owner of a pig farm, had claimed the building was vital for a farm manager to keep an eye on livestock.
But Mr Justice Cranston disagreed saying the inspector’s decision should stand, adding: “The relatively routine work does not in my mind require workers to be readily available at most times, or on hand day and night.”
The judge also said that should any emergencies arise, Lake House, where the Beathams live, was close enough to the pig sheds for any disturbance to be noticed and concluded that a farm worker living in Arlesey would be able to provide essential care for animals at a reasonably short notice.
Wheelform argued that the inspector’s report was unreasonable.
The court heard Mr Beatham had started building the property in 2005 pending completion of his own intended home Lake House, set in about three acres with its own drive and looking out over landscaped lakes and surrounded by the 22 hectare farm.
The farm also had a mobile home for its resident stockman since 1993 and in October 2004 Mid Beds District Council (MBDC) indicated it would be prepared to grant planning permission for its replacement with a farm manager’s house if Wheelform met certain obligations.
The court was told that the obligations were not met and planning permission was later refused.
But the house was substantially completed, apart from external cladding of the upper floor and the Beathams moved into the house in 2005 while Lake House continued to be built.
In November 2005, Wheelform made a retrospective application for planning permission but this was also refused and MBDC issued an enforcement notice requiring the house to be demolished.
Mr Beatham said this week after the High Court decision: “I feel I have had a raw deal and now we have lost this appeal we might have reached the end of the road and the house might have to come down.
“This whole business has cost me many thousands of pounds and it has caused a great deal of stress and strain on me and my family.
FILLED UP SO MUCH it is now a series of little islands
Roger my brother up the lake in the 50’s
Even my late sister Maria even went for walks up the lake when she was heavily pregnant in the 1970’s
It must b gut wrenching tho to go thro all the emotions of a build , and the stress ,after having 3 extensions done , and extortionate expense.Always a lot more than you have budgeted for , then to have to lay out more money to have it demolished. I am not completely heartless , BUT AGREED WITH CENTRAL BEDS! The house had to come down.
Arcangelo Lombari 