The first that Sue Jones knew about the construction of a warehouse the size of an international football stadium being built yards from her home was when she was literally thrown from her bed by the thudding of three giant pile drivers.

‘It made the whole house shake,’ said the retired soldier, 67.

When she bought her detached house in Pilning, Gloucestershire, back in 1997, the only views she had from her upstairs windows were of sheep and cattle grazing in the fields behind her home.

But on June 1 this year, her peace was shattered and rural views obliterated overnight as construction teams tore up the fields to make way for a massive warehouse, nicknamed ‘mega-shed’ by locals.

Indeed, all across Britain, regular working people wake every morning to the site of these grim-mega warehouses.

Owned and operated by business behemoths like Amazon and Europa, the huge sheds have sprung up in recent years with little warning due to insidious council planning loopholes. 

And for the residents of the once picturesque villages of Pilning, Nacton and Astley the after-effects of the installation of these modern monstrosities has been seismic. 

Speaking to the Daily Mail this week, beleaguered homeowners reported their house prices dropping, their gardens dying and their peaceful evenings being totally shattered by the endless drone of heavy machinery.  

Others claimed they had been diagnosed with Season Affective Disorder due to the lack of natural light afforded to them since their huge hut rocked up.

One woman even believes that her new nightmare neighbour has directly affected the structural integrity of her home. 

Sue Jones lives, like thousands of other British homeowners, in the shadow of a ‘mega-shed’

CORBY: And locals living underneath them have told the Mail the mental health cost is ruinous 

PILNING: These metal behemoths have began to spring up all across the country 

NORTHAMPTONSHIRE: Experts say the size, frequency and scale of the projects is likely to increase to cope with demand

MANCHESTER: However, locals already living in the shadow of them have revealed they are destroying their cherished homes 

SUFFOLK: Estate agents have consistently warned that the arrival of mega-sheds takes a hammer to house prices

In one small corner of Ipswich, you won’t hear any birdsong and you won’t see the sky and you won’t see the dawn break and you won’t see the sunset either. 

Instead the only thing you will see is an enormous grey mass of metal and steel, stretching out as far as the eye can see in every direction – and according to one consumer expert – that’s your fault. 

This week, those now living in the shadows reacted with a mixture of shock and disgust by comments made in the Telegraph by one of the chief architects of their pain, Clare Newton, commercial director at Warehouse Space. 

The businesswoman crowed: [These people] complaining about the warehouse at the bottom of [their] garden… [they’re] probably sitting on [their] couch at night ordering everything online.

‘Where [do they] think it’s coming from – a rocket from Mars? There’s an ignorance in the population. You are going to see more of them, unfortunately, because guess what, you’re causing the problem.’ 

Whilst this is obviously a blunt way of phrasing a nightmare situation for ordinary people, Newton has a point. 

Clarifying her position to the Daily Mail, she said: ‘I really do understand the concerns for the residents affected by these large buildings and have huge sympathy for the difficulties they face as a result, however I was making the point that the reason they are there – is a result in part of our own consumer spending and changing shopping habits.’ 

Indeed, in the last ten years rural idylls all across the land have been blighted by the arrivals of ‘monstrous mega sheds’  that experts insist are just a side effect of a phenomenon called ‘Delivery Britain’ which has seen a 61 per cent rise in warehouse space since 2015.

And as the term suggests when a warehouse rocks up, you soon know about it. 

Most of the colossal structures are about 45ft high (the size of a four-storey block of flats) and can measure hundreds of metres long. 

No current regulations actually exist on how big the warehouses can be and as the country is predicted to need even further warehouse space in the future, the idea of a mega-shed the size of a skyscraper is not out of the question…

And when residents do catch wind that a mega-shed is being touted for their village, there is little they can do to oppose it – as canny warehouse chiefs and councils can justify the vast intrusion into peoples’ lives because the site being built on has been marked ‘industrial’.

Real estate agents say the current crop is just the beginning – with the UK set to require the equivalent of more than 2,000 football pitches of extra warehouse space to keep up with house-building plans and the fast-fashion epidemic. 

To make matters worse, property experts now claim there is very little homeowners can do to stop a ‘mega-shed’ being built outside their house, with the decision ultimately falling on the council. 

Julie Ford, property specialist at Gothard Rowe Property Services, told the Daily Mail: ‘There isn’t actually a lot that they can do sadly. It comes down to local councils. 

‘Unless it would directly affect somebody – their health or something.’

NACTON: On Felixstowe Road, this Christmas will be the first spent in the shadow of ‘The Shed’ 

On Felixstowe Road in Nacton just outside Ipswich, locals are preparing their first Christmas overlooking a just-finished massive warehouse, which they’ve named ‘The Shed’.

The enormous structure, the size of six football pitches and 21 metres in height, dwarfs the houses and is an eyesore on their lives, however, it’s also created unforeseen issues from when it was built last year, including noise and light pollution, as well as blocking out any sunlight.

Retired couple, Dave and Sheila Ward, bought their home in 2017 when the view from the garden was an open field beyond the railway line which separates them from the warehouse.

Dave, 73, a former boss of a cleaning business he ran with his wife, 75, said: ‘It was a wonderful outlook, full of nature and birds like red kites and kestrels, now all we can see is a huge, grey warehouse. It blocks out so much light we’ve had to spend £3,000 on a roof light for the lounge to give us a bit of daylight.’

In addition, the couple has spent a whopping £8,000 on a garden pergola with shutters to block the view when they have summer barbecues with friends and family.

Dave went on to explain that concreting the field for the structure’s foundations has caused a rat infestation, as the rodents’ former habitat has been destroyed and they now run around in their garden.

‘They’re disgusting creatures,’ added Sheila. 

NACTON: Long-time resident Dave Ward spent £3,000 on a roof light for the lounge to give his family light 

The building contractor has planted a few deciduous trees following multiple complaints from homeowners

However, the mammoth shed, and all its associated problems, will linger on 

Nearby neighbour, Alan Thomas, 61, a retired telecoms engineer, has lived in his house since the age of seven. He’s furious with both East Suffolk County Council and the building firm, London-based Equation Properties. 

He said: ‘When I was a child, we enjoyed a beautiful view, particularly from the upstairs windows, you could often see deer in the fields at dusk.

‘They’re still around but now wander aimlessly looking for somewhere to graze.

‘The council has even moved a public footpath so it now goes around the warehouse, instead of its former straight route.

‘How did they get away with that when I’ve been turned down for a granny annex four times,’ he says: ‘It’s one rule for them and another for us.’

The building contractor has now planted a few trees following multiple complaints from homeowners.

Alan continued: ‘They planted the trees on a mound and failed to water them during the summer drought and when we did have any rain it ran straight off. They’re now dying. 

‘And what’s the point of planting trees that lose their leaves if you’re trying to mask a building.

‘The only trees that could hide a warehouse this big are giant redwoods.’

At the end of the row of houses affected by the development, lives 75-year-old, Jenny Day, an IT adviser. Her house overlooks the structure and she claims it’s lost value over the past year. 

She said: ‘One of my neighbours has tried to sell their property but with no interest so far. Nobody wants to move here, and I’m worried our homes could be worthless in the future.’

Jenny has put up a wooden gazebo in her garden so she can sit facing the house rather than the giant warehouse.

She’s frustrated with the council because no one is listening to her objections. The residents meet daily to discuss strategy.

‘We even asked our MP to request the building be repainted a different colour to blend in with the surroundings better but the owner refused saying it would cost too much.

‘I’m now faced with planting more trees in an attempt to mask the awful view.’

She is worried when the building is fully functioning, the employee car park, which can be seen from her house, will be lit up at night, causing even more light pollution.

‘As a group of residents, we’re now trying to get legal aid to fight for compensation for all the problems we’re facing; extra noise pollution, light pollution at night and the ever-decreasing value of our homes.’

Fellow resident, Karl Lockwood, 60, whose property is nearest to the warehouse, said: ‘The warehouse reflects the noise from the railway towards my house and you can feel the vibrations it causes, night and day. ‘It’s much louder than it used to be.

‘Lorries coming and going to and from the warehouse are causing terrible noise and this too is bouncing off the structure and it’s really hard to get to sleep at night.’

He claims cracks are appearing inside his house, due, he believes, to the vibrations caused by the warehouse reflecting train and vehicle noise.

PILNING: Locals have been forced to live in the shadow of the mega-shed which is 65ft high

PILNING: An elderly resident gazes out at the structure from his front window 

In Pilning, the ‘shed’ alone covers 500,000 square feet and at 65 feet in height, blocks light that would otherwise pour into the surrounding properties in the village.

Locals claim they are losing 15 minutes of daylight every evening as the sun dips behind the facility at dusk.

But it has been the noise and dust that most bothers villagers.

For eight weeks solid, those three pile drivers boomed away from seven in the morning until six at night, creating unbearable noise and dust.

See said: ‘We were in the middle of a summer heatwave, but I couldn’t open the windows because of the dust and noise so I ended up spending as little time in the house as possible during those hours.

‘I’d go down to Severn Beach and sit on a seawall drinking tea and eating sandwiches, I didn’t want just to escape the hell back at home.

‘By the end of those two months, I was at my wit’s end.

‘Now, although the pile drivers have ceased, there’s still endless noise and endless dust.

‘And of course the structure itself completely blocks out my views. It sits 157 yards from the back of my house. Construction workers have a direct view into my bedroom, which is also very disconcerting. I have to keep the curtains closed and I feel like my world has been turned upside down.’

She said that when she bought her home in 1997, she was aware that planning permission for industrial usage on the land was already in place, but because nothing has been built in the decades since its approval in 1957, she believed it would remain ‘dormant’.

Then, during the Covid pandemic, plans were submitted for a warehouse on the land, but nothing was built because the prospective tenant pulled out.

But in January this year, the owners of the land, Equation Properties, submitted plans for an amendment to those plan. ‘Minor alterations’, the revised plans stated, according to Sue.

In fact, she says, those minor alterations near-doubled the footprint and height of the structure, which now tops out at more than four times the height of a London double decker bus.

‘It is a brute of a building and I cannot stand it,’ she says.

‘It wasn’t even necessary to build it because in nearby Avonmouth, there are several similar-sized warehouses on an actual industrial site, nowhere near houses, that have stood empty for more than a year.

‘This is simply a speculative development with no customer at the end of it. The owners are hoping to find one by the time it’s built but it will probably be a white elephant. There are very few companies in the world, let alone round here, that need a warehouse this big.’

PILNING: Angry locals have describe the metal montrosity as a ‘brute’ of a building

Less than half a mile away, retired signwriter Andy Ward and his wife, Carol, are lumbered with an even starker view of the giant warehouse from their cottage home opposite.

Andy, 80, jokingly refers to it as ‘our little shed’, but his sense of humour masks a deepening despair at living in its mighty shadows.

He says again and again that he is not a nimby and he accepts that progress can sometimes create chaos, but he never imagined living opposite a mega warehouse in the once-quiet village he and his wife moved to 45 years ago.

The beautiful cottage the couple bought then for £29,000 – he also jokes that this is probably the current value of the property nowadays – had uninterrupted views of farmland grazed by sheep and cattle. At night he marvelled at the twinkling lights on the turrets of the distant Severn bridge crossing.

But today the skyline is dominated by the warehouse currently under construction opposite his home.

‘It’s a bloody monster,’ he says.

‘We’d move if we could sell, but no one in their right mind is going to want to buy this house now. We brought our children up here and really we need to downsize and move into something smaller because it’s just the two of us, but I guess we are locked in here now.

‘The first we knew of it was when we came home from a weekend away. 

‘There were three pile drivers hammering away simultaneously for two months, then machines smashing huge rocks and lorries reversing all day with their beepers on.

‘The noise was unbearable. It still is. The thing should be demolished.

‘We can’t even watch terrestrial television any more because the signal can’t get through the metal of the warehouse to our aerial.

The original planning permission in the 1950s was approved in order to boost future expansion of chemical, storage, and distribution industries.

The ‘consent’ also means councillors are prohibited from taking into account many issues raised by residents.

Locals say estate agents have told them the new warehouse has wiped up to ten per cent off the value of their homes.

The ‘1957/58 Severnside Consent’ refers to significant, large-area planning permissions granted to chemical industries for industrial development in the Severnside area of South Gloucestershire, UK.

The permissions were granted to facilitate future industrial expansion over a large area of land – approximately 650 to more than 1,000 hectares (1,000 hectares is about 1,400 football pitches).

They are ‘extant’ or still valid today, meaning that much of the land benefits from this existing planning permission for uses such as industrial, storage, and distribution.

It allows development to proceed without necessarily requiring the same level of investment in strategic flood or ecological mitigation that new permissions would need.

A South Gloucestershire Council development management committee report notes that ‘the 1957 consent is a very “open” permission, and very different to an outline consent granted in the modern planning regime’.

It stated that legal advice was sought and ‘Counsel’s opinion confirmed that limited control can be exercised over this development’.

The report added: ‘The grant of outline permission constitutes a commitment by the planning authority to the principle of development, preventing them from refusing approval of reserved matters on grounds relating to the principle of development.’

Claire Young MP, Liberal Democrat for Pilning and Yate, has raised the issue in the Commons.

She said: ‘Historic consents need to be looked at and we need legislation to introduce modern conditions on them, so we don’t have this situation where people’s very reasonable concerns can’t be taken into consideration.

‘In the early 90s the government regularised this for quarries but they didn’t fix ones like this (Severnside) consent.

‘Now I’m asking them to finish the job and that’s why I’m calling for a debate to directly ask ministers.’

In a statement, South Gloucestershire Council explained they had limited powers to halt the project.

A spokesperson for South Gloucestershire Council, said: ‘Much of the new development at Severnside is governed by a planning permission granted in 1957, pre-dating both South Gloucestershire Council and probably the arrival of many local residents in Easter Compton.

‘This permission gives wide ranging powers for development with limited remaining control for the council to exercise.’

Just outside Manchester in the suburb of Astley, Paula Boardman is living every homeowners worst nightmare

Her quiet suburb was shattered when the huge super-shed structure was constructed almost overnight 

And now she claims the unwelcome neighbour has left gaping holes in her forever home

Just outside Manchester in the suburb of Astley, Paula Boardman has fond memories of watching the sunset over the back of her garden. 

These days all she can see is an endless supershed where the sky should be.

She and other residents have launched a campaign group to fight the development and even met with mayor Andy Burnham. 

Tragically,  Paula now fears she is trapped in a ‘nightmare’ after structural faults appeared in her home following the massive construction project starting.

A hairline like fracture now runs down the side of her home, and the floor of her kitchen has started to buckle and break.

She said: ‘I think there must have been some subsidence because the construction project has dug down so deep.

‘We now have to prove that the structural damage to our home happened after the building work started. Obviously I did not take photographs of the side of my house before all this started. I mean why would I?

‘My insurance company is now in dialogue with the developer’s insurers – but I am not hopeful. I am now being told nothing will happen before May. I can’t sell the house because of the existing damage. But all of this will also impact on the sale price. My partner who works in the building sector is absolutely livid.’

Paula said that she feels let down by the local authority who have given the scheme the greenlight.

She said: ‘We had been here for 18 years and now just feel trapped in a nightmare. We received no notification of the scheme at the bottom of our garden.

‘But when the framework went up we realised the full scale of the warehouse. Every morning I wake up and just can’t believe it. The skyline has gone. We are just stuck. I just feel very let down by all concerned.’

Plans from development giants PLP show the enormous complex will eventually host four warehouses, with the council agreeing to a maximum height of 18.3m (60ft) for two of the buildings. Delivery outfit Whistl has signed a 15-year deal for the unit.

A hairline like fracture now runs down the side of her home, and the floor of her kitchen has started to buckle and break

Patricia Court, whose home also backs onto the sprawling super shed site, said: ‘The developers have built a pathway which runs along the bottom of my garden. I just feel a total lack of privacy and I am not happy.

‘I have no idea what all this means for the value of my home – but it’s obviously bad news. We know it’s going to be a distribution warehouse so there will be noise and light on a 24/7 basis.’

Margaret Poole said:’ I found out through word of mouth – I received nothing in writing.

‘My house is something I can leave for my children and I am not sure what it’s worth now. I do know one of my neighbour’s has had her house on the market for nine months. So what does that tell you?’

A spokesperson for Wigan Council said: ‘While the decision to grant planning permission is consistent with national planning policy, we recognise and understand the concerns expressed by residents. We are committed to engaging constructively to address these issues wherever possible and to ensure that residents’ voices are heard throughout this process.

‘To that end, we are maintaining open and ongoing communication with the developer and will be seeking further assurances and detailed responses in relation to the matters raised by local residents. 

‘Our priority is to work together to find practical solutions and to minimise any adverse impact on the community.’

A Government spokesperson said: ‘We’re taking decisive action to update the planning system and get Britain building, while ensuring communities are engaged with developers’ plans.

‘Councils are ultimately responsible for reviewing old permissions if the development is no longer suitable and deciding whether action is necessary.’