Council planners have been told to have a rethink after they tried to force a pub applying for a beer garden extension to face all the unmoveable chairs in the same direction. The proposed stipulation was questioned by councillors, with one saying "it would never work".
The application was being considered by North Warwickshire Borough Council planning board, and featured other measures to combat noise such as the building of fences and walls. The owners of The Office, in Warton, Tamworth, were seeking to convert a patch of council-owned land into a seating area with a pergola and raised flower beds.
However, after a neighbour raised an objection over the potential for noise pollution, the council carried out a noise assessment which recommended the seats would all be permanently fixed to the ground such that oriented in the same direction.
Planning officer Jeff Brown told the meeting: “The main issue here is noise and we have had representation from one of the immediate neighbours and our environmental health officer has raised that issue. Therefore a noise assessment was commissioned by the applicant and the recommendations are quite clear with the conclusion stating that noise was not considered a reason for refusal.”
Mr Brown went on to explain that the council’s environmental officer agreed with the assessment and that the applicant was happy with the proposed mitigation measures – the lowering of the site with barriers then put in place incorporating walls and fencing which would aim to filter out the noise before it reached neighbouring properties. The existing beer garden was only allowed to open until 9pm and that condition was also put on the new extension.
But committee chairman Cllr Mark Simpson was unconvinced by the final condition that all the unmoveable chairs should be made to face inin the same direction.
He said: “I am simply trying to think what it would be like in reality – if two people go and sit in a beer garden, they typically want to sit opposite each other. I don’t think that having all the seats facing in the same direction will ever work.
“I would like to move the recommendation subject to clarification of the matters identified. We want to protect the residents but we don’t want something that is unenforceable.”
