Housing plans set to call time on another pub
ANOTHER of Bollington’s pubs looks set to be lost to housing developers after plans were approved.
The Crown, on Church Street, currently stands empty and boarded up but was said to be a ‘thriving’ business before the Covid pandemic.
It had been hoped the pub could be reopened but Cheshire East Council’s northern planning committee approved an application from Alderley GB to turn the building into two homes.
The meeting heard that since 2012 the Queens Arms, the Royal Oak, the Meridian and the Red Lion have all shut and been converted into residential accommodation.
Bollington Town Council had objected to the proposals but were told it was simply not viable to reopen the
Crown because structural repairs were needed.
Councillor Amanda Stott, from the town council, said: “At one point Bollington had a pub on virtually every corner, over the years most of them have been turned into residential dwellings.
”They are a vital part of the community. Up until that point (lockdown) it had been a vibrant and profitable business.”
Fellow town councillor John Weston said: “Each time the residential value of these properties becomes higher than the commercial value the developers move in.
”This is extremely important to the health of the local economy, in order for us to be sustainable as a town we need employment.”
The meeting heard the Crown was in need of ‘extensive’ structural repairs. And agent for the development Jim Eccles said marketing of the building to more than 1,000 business clients had failed to garner any interest.
It was questioned how much marketing had been done locally and whether there would have been more interest outside of a pandemic.
Mr Eccles said: “There are six pubs within 450m of the Crown and, we believe, 12 pubs in Bollington.
”Not enough people were visiting the pub often enough. In 2019 the previous owner had decided to sell. There’s no prospect of the building opening as a pub.
”The viability simply isn’t there. This is before the impact of the pandemic is taken into account.”
A separate planning application, which has yet to be decided, also seeks to build three homes on a car park behind the Crown.
The committee voted to pass the application by 10 votes to one.
Councillor Liz Braithwaite said: “It seems to me a choice between housing or a derelict, boarded up building.”