Oxford University professors handed £200k after launching claim against hotel next door over collapsed garden wall
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GB News
Two Oxford University professors have been awarded £200,000 after they launched a claim against a hotel over one of its walls collapsing next to their house.
Nick Stargardt, a history professor, and Fernanda Pirie, his anthropologist partner, bought the Grade II listed building back in 2018.
They quickly began renovating the six-bedroom property in Oxford but works hit a standstill when a section of the garden wall next to neighbouring Hawkwell House Hotel fell in on itself.
The professors claim that the collapse happened due to a buildup of soil on the hotel’s side which left the ground three metres higher, which resulted in the wall collapsing due to its weight.
The professors claim that the collapse happened due to a buildup of soil on the hotel’s side which left the ground three metres higher
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A court declared last year that the soil-buildup was a legal “nuisance” and the owners of the Hawkwell House Hotel would need to pay the couple £200,000 in damages.
The gardens of the two properties are separated by a stone wall, however, over time, the ground level on the hotel side has increased so much that it is now roughly level with the top of the wall.
The couple have said that the increased elevation means that hotel workers are “smoking and chatting” too close to their front door, and they feel like their privacy has been compromised.
They are now demanding that the ground level on the hotel side should be lowered to its original level.
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The case was then taken to the High Court, where the hotel owners argued that the ground should remain at the same height.
They said that a better alternative would be keeping the level the same and building a stronger “retaining wall”.
However, Justice Adam Johnson has given his backing to the couple and ordered the hotel to lower the ground on its side of the wall.
He said: “I agree with Prof Pirie's submission that there is nothing unduly onerous in requiring the appellants, once the earth on their side of the wall has been reduced to a more acceptable level, to refrain from causing any further build-up in a manner likely to cause yet another nuisance.
Hawkwell House Hotel is a 77-bedroom property which describes itself as 'Oxford’s best kept secret'
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“That is a rational response to the nature of the nuisance found.”
Stargardt is one of the UK’s leading experts on Nazi Germany, whilst his partner, Pirie, is a qualified barrister and professor of the anthropology of law at Oxford University.
They live at the Priory, a six-bedroom home which dates back to the 1830s and is valued at £1.8million.
Neighbouring Hawkwell House Hotel is a 77-bedroom property which describes itself as “Oxford’s best kept secret”.
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