Variation of condition U27543 NS04 of planning permission granted on 29 July 2009 (08/4312/FUL) for the continuation of planning permission granted 11 December 2007 (07/1235/FUL), to allow permanent mixed use as garden centre (Class A1) and café/restaurant (Class A3); namely, to include opening between 19.00 to 23.00 hours on Saturday every week..  

Officer recommendation: REFUSAL

Having declared that he had predetermined the matter at hand Councillor Miller withdrew from the Committee for the duration of the item.

The Development Control Officer introduced the item and reported the following written representations received from interested parties and amendments made by officers following publication of the agenda.

A further letter was received from Petersham Nurseries, responding to specific objections relating to:

• Customer car use;
• Mitigation of any adverse impact on River Lane and surrounding roads;
• Car use by employees;
• Conduct of employees;
• Support for the local economy;
• Minimising disruption through noise;
• Impact on the conservation area/local ecology;
• Light pollution;
• Delivery plans;
• Control of restaurant fumes.

The following corrections and clarifications to the officer’s report:

• With regard to the reference in the Summary to the Green Travel Plan, officers wished to clarify that the mitigation effects relate to the measures put in place between the original grant of planning permission for the restaurant element on a temporary basis and the subsequent grant of permission on a permanent basis. No systematic review of the Green Travel Plan had been undertaken since that time although it was anticipated that a review would be undertaken by the operators in September.

A review of the Green Travel Plan submitted in January 2011 was based on surveys undertaken in February 2010, whereas the original surveys were undertaken in September 2008. The review was therefore not comparing like with like and the applicants were asked to resubmit when September surveys had been undertaken.

• Paragraph 34 erroneously described Church Lane as a local distributor road. It was, in fact, an adopted highway only from Petersham Road to St Peter’s Church. Thereafter it was an unadopted private lane. It was therefore not a local distributor road.
• In paragraph 38, these figures had been supplied by the applicant and assessed by the Transport Officer who recommended, in paragraph 40, that further systematic monitoring should take place.

The Committee heard representations against the application from Mrs Powell, Mrs Flannery and Mr Simon

The Committee heard representations in favour of the application from Charlotte Senn, Scottie Bhattarai, employees at the Nursery and café respectively.

The Committee heard a representation from Councillor Miller who spoke as an interested Councillor.

The Development Control Officer responded to some of the points raised by speakers.

The Committee considered the information received from officers and from those who had made representations in addition to that contained in the in the report and addendum.  They discussed the application and in particular they considered the following themes:

(i)      The impact of traffic to and from the Nursery in the evening and the possibility that that would be increased should the application be granted.

(ii)    The potential impact on residents’ enjoyment of the area.

(iii)   The designation of the area as being Metropolitan Open Land and the implications of that designation for A3 use at the venue.

(iv)  The measures suggested by the applicant to mitigate such impacts on neighbours, such as the Travel Plan.

It was RESOLVED:

That the application be refused for the reasons set out in the officer’s report.

[Councillor Bouchier left the meeting. 22:50pm]