 The bund contained chalk, concrete, soil, bricks, plastic, metal and wood |
A council has been told to remove mounds of chalk and waste which remain on common land more than two years after being deposited without consent. The material was built up at Telscombe Tye, in East Sussex, to form a bund - a sloping barrier aimed at impeding the path of unauthorised vehicles.
But the mound did not have planning permission and the chalk was found to be contaminated with building waste.
Telscombe Town Council has been given four months to get rid of the material.
The order came from the Planning Inspectorate, which upheld an enforcement notice issued by East Sussex County Council in June 2006.
The bund was originally put in place by the Sussex Downs Conservation Board [now part of the South Downs Joint Committee], the manager of Telscombe Tye on behalf of the town council, which owns the land.
 The town council said there were errors when the bund was made |
A town council spokeswoman said: "The contractors were bringing in clean chalk, but in the event it had builders' rubble, concrete and wire in it."
She said the council understood at the time that planning permission was not required, but that was not in fact the case.
An application for retrospective planning permission was turned down in July 2005.
The town council said it had now submitted new planning applications with the county council, meaning it may be allowed to rebuild the bund properly once it has complied with the enforcement notice.
The spokeswoman said: "It is needed in order to return the chalk downland to what it used to be, and also to keep unauthorised vehicles off."
But local opponent Jackie Rowland said the mile-long and 3ft (91cm) high bund was just a "wide strip of waste, topped with earth and a sea of thistles" in an area of outstanding natural beauty.
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