RESIDENTS in a street in Littlemore say their lives have been made a misery by new industrial buildings.

People in Spring Lane claim the buildings breach planning conditions as one is higher than was initially proposed and is not the correct colour.

Developer Kier Property was given permission in March to build nine single-storey terraced industrial units at the site off Sandy Lane West, which also borders Spring Lane.

But residents claim the buildings are taller than the maximum 9.4m Kier Property stated and are towering over their homes.

Maureen Kimber, who has lived in Spring Lane with her husband Alan for 33 years, was one of a number of people who met with a planning enforcement officer from Oxford City Council to discuss the issues last Wednesday.

The 80-year-old said: “It is not very good at all. They call it a one-storey building but it is taller than our house.

“It is all we can see out the front of our house and even if we step out the back door we see it. It is such a horrible building.

“We feel as though the city council just ignores people’s feelings and what they have got to say.”

In the planning application, the buildings have an internal height of 6.5m and an external height between 8.9m and 9.4 m.

But Keith Manning, who bought his house in in 1988, said one of the buildings is taller than his home. He said: “The ridge height on one of them is too high.

“I acknowledge that it is an industrial area but the buildings going up are not pretty and are not in keeping with the rest of the area. It is a bit of a miserable situation.”

The planning enforcement team at the city council is due to look at the issues raised by residents and come back with a conclusion in the near future.

Littlemore parish councillor David Henwood said the buildings’ height appeared to have been increased by changes to the ground of the site.

He said: “One of the things we noticed was that they have built up the ground level by almost two feet.

“Residents were told they were going to be single storey so they conjured up an image in their minds of what that could look like. They are massive and they completely dominate the landscape. They do not seem an appropriate link at all with the locality. It is a nightmare scenario.

“Residents have raised a number of issues with the enforcement officer and she is going to study them in detail and report back in the near future.”

Kier Property did not respond to requests for a comment.