RESIDENTS of a street in Prestonpans have lost their fight to keep their bin sheds after building them on shrubbery beds outside their garden gates.

Homeowners living on Pithead Heights created the wooden covers after arguing that East Lothian Council’s decision to only empty household waste every three weeks left them with stinking bins in their small gardens.

And they pointed out that there was nothing to stop them putting the bins themselves out on the street, adding that the wooden covers simply made them look more tidy.

Council planners ordered the sheds be removed after a single complaint.

Two residents who appealed an enforcement notice to Scottish Ministers have now lost their battle, after the Scottish Government Reporter backed council planners, saying that the land the bins were on must be returned to communal space.

At least four homeowners on the street installed the wooden storage units over the last four years.

However, the single complaint from another resident led to years of wrangling with the local authority as the householders were ordered to apply for planning permission for the sheds, which was then refused.

READ MORE: Prestonpans residents angry at order to remove bin sheds

Residents Christine Klien and Susan Ralston both appealed the order from the council to remove their bin sheds.

A third resident, Debbie Gray, had her appeal dismissed as being submitted a day too late for consideration by the Reporter.

At the time, Debbie, a nurse, criticised the council for wasting money pursuing the enforcement notices.

She said: “There is nothing to stop us putting our bins outside our gates all the time.

"All we have done is put up a storage unit which makes it look tidy and stops recycling from being swept all over the street in windy weather.

“East Lothian Council is always banging on that it has no money, so why is it wasting public funds pursuing enforcement action? It is a huge waste of time and money over something which received a single complaint and is doing no harm.”

Christine, a business operations manager, said she was stunned when the council told her she had unlawfully “extended her garden”.

She said: “They have no problem with the bins being left on the same strip of land all the time; other residents have put slabs down over the shrubbery to create a neat spot for them and not faced action.

“I have a dog and, if I keep the household bin in the garden, he goes straight to it because the three-weekly collections mean it can smell. It ruins the garden for us.”

The Reporter dismissed both appeals, saying that the plans for the houses clearly showed that no planning permission was in place for the sheds and they did breach planning rules.