PLANS to turn a prominent and empty Sharpness pub and hotel into five new flats have been rejected.

A change of use planning application was put forward to Stroud District Council to transform the vacant Pier View Hotel in Oldminster Road.

Proposals - submitted by GFC Property Ltd in November last year - also included constructing a new extension and installing new vehicular and pedestrian accesses.

According to the application, the plan included creating three two-bedroom flats and two three-bedroom flats at the site. 

The application received one objection comment from a resident who stated the community needed more facilities not houses.

“This is a much needed facility and I strongly object to the proposal to change its use," the resident said. 

“There are few social infrastructure facilities for the existing community, planning applications for more houses puts an even greater strain on the existing infrastructure."

They added: “The community does not need more houses - it needs more facilities.”

Plans were officially rejected by SDC on Thursday, July 25.

It comes as a nearby application for nine new homes behind the hotel site were also rejected by SDC.

A refusal planning document reads: “The proposed residential conversion would result in the loss of a public house.

“Insufficient information has been submitted to adequately evidence that there is no prospect of a continued community use; that there are adequate similar community use facilities nearby; or that the use of the building as a public house is no longer viable.

“The application fails to demonstrate that there are sufficient similar uses that are accessible for the community.

“The proposed single storey rear extension by reason of its height and width in combination with the pattern and size of openings, would appear poorly proportioned and detailed.

“It would not appear compatible with the host property and would fail to respect the character and appearance of the Pier View, a Victorian characterful building.”

A planning document from the applicant reads: “We believe that through our analysis of the existing context of the site and its environment, we have developed a proposal which uses this precedent as the starting point for making a scheme which is entirely appropriate.

“Careful consideration of this site, the existing building types and their character and the spaces which surround it have been used to underpin the proposal and it is from these that we have arrived at the scheme presented here.”

You can view the application quoting S.23/2310/FUL or see here - tinyurl.com/2wwe2kft