A BATTLE over blazing floodlights on top of a car park in St Albans is still in full swing following a further appeal by developers.

More than two years on from when they were first installed on top of the station car park, the 6.2 metre-high lamp columns which shine onto properties in Ridgmont Road and Lime Tree Place are still just over three metres higher than their original design.

At a planning committee meeting in April this year, St Albans district council rejected developers’ Linden Homes suggestion of reducing the height of the columns by two metres on the grounds that the resulting columns would still be too tall.

But at the end of last month, Linden Homes development director Gary Taylor appealed against the council’s decision, claiming that 4.3 metre-high floodlights would be short enough to contain light spill to the roof of the car park, and not beyond its edges.

Mr Taylor, who has also agreed to the introduction of measures such as cowling around the front edge of the light lanterns to further prevent light spill, said that he was confident that the new lights would eradicate any light pollution threat to neighbours.

He added: “Such mitigation measures will ensure light and glare nuisance is reduced to zero and evidence will be presented that such action will eradicate any potential light nuisance or glare to any nearby resident.”