Pies and prejudice... over a Greggs shop
It is a fashionable Georgian road, mentioned in the novels of Jane Austen, and Bath’s most prestigious shopping area.
Well-heeled customers dip in and out of Milsom Street’s designer shops, luxury boutiques and upmarket restaurants.
But the rumoured arrival of a different sort of outlet has sent a ripple of disapproval along the 18th century terraces.
For residents fear an empty bank is about to be turned into a branch of Greggs, the bakery chain famed for its cheap sausage rolls, pies and steak bakes.
the Grade-II listed premises has been empty for 15 months, but Bath and North East Somerset Council has won approval to allow a restaurant or cafe there – known in town hall jargon as an A3 establishment.
Campaign groups Bath Heritage Watchdog and the Bath Preservation trust fear the street’s reputation could be tarnished.
Milsom Street is around the corner from where Jane Austen lived in the early 1800s and she wrote about it in her novels Northanger Abbey and Persuasion.
the Bath Heritage Watchdog group said: ‘It will not take much… for the reputation of a shopping destination to disappear.’
the Bath Preservation trust said: ‘A3 use is inappropriate and unwanted and would harm the special historic interest. [this] could lead to legitimate but inappropriate food businesses within what is Bath’s most prestigious shopping street.’
But local authority planning officers backed the application, saying: ‘the unit is vacant and has a deadening effect on the street. Allowing a new use will help to preserve and enhance both the listed asset and the conservation area.’
Greggs declined to comment.