A major programme to replace all the windows in council tower blocks in South Bristol is under investigation after residents complained of a loud high-pitched whistling sound that fills their homes whenever it’s windy.
Bristol City Council is working with the contractor it has hired to undertake the work, after residents of one of the first blocks of flats that had new windows fitted - Gaywood House in Bedminster - said the whistling noise was making their lives a misery.
The residents in more than 40 of the 67 flats at the 12-storey Gaywood House, on North Street, said they were affected by the issue, which one couple said was causing health problems.
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The city council hired Rate Avon for the huge task of replacing windows in council-owned tower blocks across South Bristol. Originally built in 1963, Gaywood House, is a council-owned block for the over-60s, and was one of the first to be refurbished, with work starting there in 2019. Rate Avon’s programme has now moved up to tower blocks in Hartcliffe, but back in Bedminster, there are problems.
Dave and Lou Williams live on the first floor, and were one of the last to have their windows replaced in 2021. In the autumn of 2021, they first noticed that every time it was windy outside, there would be a high-pitched howling whistle coming from the windows. In certain conditions, two different windows gave off two different, discordant pitched noises, and the noise was so loud, it began to badly affect their quality of life.
“You turn the television volume up to try and drown it out, but then the neighbours complain the TV is too loud,” said Lou. “If it starts getting windy in the night, it’ll wake you up. This morning it woke me up at 5am and hasn’t really stopped since. It gives me a headache, and then a migraine. I’ve had two lots of paracetamol already this morning and I’ve had to go out because I just can’t stand it in there any more while it’s there. It affects you constantly. You can’t just sit in the flat when it’s windy, it’s just there all the time. It gets you down,” she added.
Dave Williams said contractors who did the initial work have been back many times to solve the issue, but can’t find the cause. “When it first started happening, we checked the windows, and it’s the strangest thing but the curtains don’t even move,” he said.
“There’s no draft you can see or feel. They came and put sealant all around the windows, and that made the flat warmer, and the noise did stop for a couple of days, and they thought they’d solved it, but it was because it wasn’t windy. It soon started again with the next bit of wind,” he added.
Rate Avon asked the couple to find out if any other residents of Gaywood House were experiencing the same issues. “We felt that was sort of their job, but we started knocking on doors. In the end we put a sheet up on the noticeboard and got everyone to tick whether or not they were having the same thing, and people in more than 40 of the flats here said yes, it was happening to them. It seems to be worse further down the floors,” said Lou.
"They've been out and had a look," she said. "They've told us we are the 'test case', the 'guinea pigs' for the whole block because we're on the first floor and they can get a ladder up to us easily, without the need for scaffolding to come back. But they've told us that if they can't work out what's going on or fix it, then they could have to come back and replace all the windows again," she added.
For most of 2022, the couple have been appealing to Rate Avon and the city council to come and fix the problem, and Lou said the last straw was during the storms in the week before Christmas, which were ‘unbearable’. “I called them and said it was bad and they said they were off now until the New Year so weren’t coming back,” she said.
The day after Bristol Live contacted Bristol City Council about the plight of residents in Gaywood House, council representatives from the project did finally make a visit, and now the council has said they will be investigating. When asked if there were similar issues at other blocks of flats that had already been part of the refurbishment programme, the council said that they were regarding it as an ‘isolated issue’.
A spokesperson for Bristol City Council said: “We have been made aware of this issue by some residents at Gaywood House, after windows were replaced as part of a refurbishment in 2019-21.
“This issue was raised before the end of the twelve month defect period and was highlighted to the main contractor for them to resolve. Following a meeting with residents and a joint site visit with the contractor, we have identified flats where further investigation of this isolated issue is required. We will also be writing to all residents at Gaywood House before further repairs are rolled out at this block,” she added.
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