Gatehouse plans recommended for approval (From Western Telegraph)

Gatehouse plans recommended for approval

9:40am Wednesday 22nd February 2012 in News

Planners look set today (Wednesday) to agree to an application that could signal a move forward on a multi-million pound development for Tenby.

Planning permission has already been granted for apartments, a cinema, hotel and commercial units on and around the site of the town's Royal Gatehouse Hotel, which was ravaged by fire four years ago.

But the developers, South Terrace Properties Ltd., have since requested a variation of planning conditions to allow retail, financial or food and drink use at the cinema space.

Lack of commercial interest in re-opening a cinema in the town - said to require a £900,000 capital investment - has been holding back development funding.

The Pembrokeshire Coast National Park Authority's development management committee is being recommended to approve the application at its meeting today. This is despite opposition from Tenby Town Council, which does not feel that the potential for a cinema in this location has been fully explored, and also Tenby Civic Society, which has stated that the removal of a cinema would take away the 'sole social benefit' of the scheme in White Lion Street'.

National Park planning officers feel that 'a unique set of circumstances' would justify the loss of a cinema, although the ground floor area of the space would not be suitable for affordable housing.

The application is being recommended for approval, subject to the recepit of satisfactory evidence in relation to the employment uses, and a Section 106 agreement requiring a payment of nearly £12,000 to be used for upgrading community facilities.