FAMILIES who have been fighting the Battle of the Bulge for eight years are celebrating a victory.

Residents of Hightown, Rossendale, have lived since 1989 in homes perched on top of a 20-foot retaining wall declared unsafe by council engineers.

Now a solution is in sight and residents' spokesman Tom Keymer, 70, said: "We are over the moon."

When the problem was discovered the 13 Hightown families were warned not to go into their front gardens and have had to take a detour to get to their homes since the road next to the danger wall was closed.

Rossendale Council is proposing a radical solution to the problem of the bulging wall - building a second wall and tying it to the faulty one by pouring concrete down the gap.

The solution will mean the council having to break its own rules of using only natural stone in country areas. Engineers advised that using artificial stone to build the second wall would be safest.

But Mr Keymer said: "We are delighted. As long as the wall is made safe we don't mind about the stone." Mr Keymer and his wife Elsie contacted the local government ombudsman to find a solution to the wall which he says has led to houses being sold for a bargain £10,000.

"With the wall in the state it was, building societies would not give mortgages," he said.

For the next six weeks, while the road is repaired, the residents face having to park just off Burnley Road East and walk up to their houses.

But Mr Keymer said this was a small price to pay for an end to the uncertainty they have lived with.

A problem for the council has been that no-one knows who owns the wall. In the absence of a legal owner the council is repairing the wall itself.

Members of the council's planning committee have been told engineers believe they have devised the solution which will be the safest and will cause the least problems for the council or the owners if they are ever found.

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