Park 'willbe engulfed'by mosqueexpansion

PLANS to double the size of a Hull mosque in the city’s oldest park have run into opposition.

Worshippers at the Jame Masjid and Madrasah in Pearson Park say they need to expand as they have run out of room.

They want to build extensions to the side and front of the Victorian villa that the mosque occupies overlooking the park to include room for up to 700 men and women to pray as well as facilities for ritual ablutions.

However, neighbour Claire Gurnell, who moved in next door earlier this year, said the planned expansion would “engulf and take over” a tranquil corner of the city.

Residents living in the conservation area were told this week that they have to pay 150 to apply for retrospective planning permission if they had installed satellite dishes on the front of their houses.

Ms Gurnell said: “They are saying an 18-inch disc causes problems and people have had small porches at the front of the houses refused and now they are proposing this over-development.

“This is just going to engulf and take over the park.”

Another resident added: “I have no problems with the mosque and the people who worship there, they are always very well behaved, but a building like this will end up dominating the area. Where are they all going to park?”

The mosque’s caretaker, Abdul Rahim, said it had too little space for men at Friday prayers and had to lay carpets outside. As well as creating new prayer rooms, there will be facilities for washing dead bodies as part of Islamic funeral rites.

Mr Rahim said in nearly 20 years there had not been a complaint until the new next-door neighbours moved in.

He added: “We have five rooms but there is still not enough space. In bad weather it is a problem for us.”