A blaze in the northern sky.

[Globalti]

Quite often up here in the NW you see old chapels that have been converted into residences but it's expensive and if they are listed you are up against planners at every turn. Not to mention the heat loss as they were built at a time when coal was cheap and buildings weren't insulated. Maintenance is expensive thanks to the complex roofs, stonework and leadwork and there's often no damp-proof course. Give me a modern, thermally-efficient house any day.

 

[threebikesmcginty]

Nice easy ride for the developer now, not-that-I'm-suggesting-they-were-anyway-involved. In Scotchland I think they call this 'to go on fire'.

 

[Salty seadog]

That's terrible.
Was the church still in regular use? I only ask as there appear to be lots of suspicious fires in old, often listed buildings that have fallen out of use but which developers can't get permission to knock down...

https://goo.gl/maps/46Guwkwfkrq

This church suffered similar. It had been fully redeveloped into accommodation. Before anyone moved in it somehow caught fire. This was 10 years ago and it remains in the same overgrown and roofless state to this day.

 

[Salad Dodger]

Its sickening.

Down in my part of the world, over the course of the last 3 weeks the little darlings have completely destroyed a childrens play area in one local park by fire, and have smashed a lot of the boundary fence around another play area. Credit to the local council (which is not a phrase I utter very often!) who repaired the latter damage within just a couple of days, so that the play area could safely re-open.