A grandmother’s dream home has quickly turned into a nightmare after she realised the proximity to a busy A-road made living on the property more difficult than expected.

Jackie McCormack, 58, and her husband James spent £350,000 on a new-build home located just nine feet from the busy 70mph A446. Despite viewing the detached three-bedroom home in Coleshill, near Birmingham, seven times before moving in, the pair didn’t realise staying so close to the busy road would mean being surrounded by loud noise for many hours a day.

After they “absolutely fell in love” with the property, the pair moved into their new home on a Friday in February. By the next morning, they realised the main issue of their new house.

Mrs McCormack told the Sun Online: “I knew it was a busy road – there’s no getting away from that. I would be stupid if I didn’t think it was a busy road. But this – how could I have known?”

She added it was impossible for her to understand how difficult the situation was until she moved in and experienced it first-hand.

She added: “I will put my hand up and say we should have done our homework – but there’s no way this house should be so close to the road. I do feel stupid – but I didn’t think it was going to be this bad. I genuinely didn’t.” 

The grandmother, who works as a disability charity advocate, said the sound she can hear from her property was “absolutely horrendous”, adding: “I know it’s a really important road but it’s impacting our mental health.”

While she stressed she isn’t putting the blame on either the estate agent or the planners, she told BirminghamLive that had she been shown the place at 2pm, when the traffic on the near road is particularly intense, “we wouldn’t have touched it with a barge pole”.

Similarly, she wonders how planning permission for the house was approved when it’s located so close to the road.

Cars and lorries can be heard from Mr and Mrs McCormack’s property between 5.30am and 8.30pm on weekdays.

During weekends, boy racer cars can be heard speeding at up to 100mph from mid-morning until the early hours, the grandmother said. 

Testing showed the sound hits 85 decibels inside the couple’s home and 120 in their garden, Mrs McCormack said.

Her husband, who makes aircraft engines with Rolls Royce, said the noise at their home is comparable to what he hears when he works.

On top of the noise, the house also shakes when heavy good vehicles pass by, and their lights can breach through the windows at night.

Pollution, the couple realised, is also an issue, with Mrs McCormack saying she could write her name in the dust that travels through her converter fan to settle in her en suite – leaving her to wonder “what we are breathing in”. 

Mrs McCormack is now lobbying Warwickshire County Council to install crash barriers and reduce the speed limit to 40mph, to allow his grandson to play safely in the garden, which she has described as “a no-go area” at the moment.

The doting grandmother had set up the area with a goalpost for the child, but she doesn’t think it will ever be safe for her grandson to spend time there “unless they reduce that speed”.

She added: “I wouldn’t allow my grandson to play outside, it’s too scary. It’s the speed at which the juggernauts go past, it’s the speed of the racers, they’re doing wheelies, it’s absolutely shocking.”

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Conceding she had not researched the area before moving in, she added: “I didn’t realise there was an injunction regarding boy racers on the A446, they don’t take any notice of it.” 

One neighbour, who didn’t wish to be named, said to feel sorry for the couple, but added they should have predicted how noisy the area would be.

They said: “You should know what the noise is like before you buy a house next to a dual carriageway.”

Mrs McCormack, however, argued the house should not have been built so close to the road in the first place, insisting she “didn’t think it was going to be this bad”.

The A446, also known as Lichfield Road, runs to the northeast of Birmingham in the West Midlands and it’s one of the area’s main traffic arteries.

Warwickshire County Council said it is aware of the problems and will consider “very carefully” whether to recommend possible solutions.

A spokesperson said: “A meeting is currently being arranged with various stakeholders to discuss this.

“Obviously, there is no guarantee that it will be possible to provide any measures, but we will consider the issues raised very carefully and aim to recommend possible solutions.”

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