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From the
https://londonist.com By Rachel Holdsworth, October 2012.
Plans To Turn Catford Bridge Tavern Into A Supermarket.
South East London is in a bit of a state after it transpired the
Catford Bridge Tavern is likely to be turned into a small
supermarket.
The pub, which used to be the notorious "Copperfield" but was recently
taken over, refurbished and re-opened by the Antic chain, is the
subject of a planning application to Lewisham Council. This
application, by the building's owners, is for turning the currently
little used upper floors into flats – but the killer line comes in
the notes.
It was disclosed that the lower level of the existing public house
was currently undergoing a transaction that the public house would
be subject to a change of use to planning class A1 which would be
taken up by a national retailer.
Catford and Lewisham are awash with high street versions of large
supermarket chains (your correspondent could get up from this desk
and walk to four of them within 10 minutes) but only recently have
some of the, previously a bit scary, local pubs started to become
places that are welcoming to everyone. Local MP Heidi Alexander told
us.
The Catford Bridge Tavern is one of the best things to have happened
to Catford in the last few years and I am adamant that it must stay.
Catford has been crying out for a decent pub for years. We have just
got one in the shape of the Catford Bridge Tavern and it would be a
huge blow to the area if it was forced to close. I'd encourage
anyone who wants to keep this pub in Catford to write to the
Planning Department at Lewisham Council and to make their views
known.
Antic weren't even aware of the plan until last week and have
started a campaign to save the pub, with advice on how to object,
and Brockley Central has suggested possible grounds. These are worth
reading because the developer is being rather cunning; the change to
the pub itself isn't covered by this planning application so by
getting the flats in first, the pub won't survive when people are
living above it and hey presto, there'll be an empty unit for a
supermarket chain to walk into.
What's happening in SE6 is just one of several similar incidents
around London. Another Antic pub, The Old Fire Station in
Hammersmith, was turfed out of its home last month after the
building was sold at auction. The former George IV in Brixton is
becoming a Tesco Express. The Wenlock Arms was only saved from
development after Hackney Council made it a listed building. The
property market means there's more money to be made from residential
and retail than a nice pub.
Where boozers are leased there's always the chance they could be
shut down, no matter how successful, popular or community focused.
Antic were aware of the risks when they took on the Hammersmith and
Catford leases, but what kind of message does this send to
responsible companies looking to turn around failing pubs? The Old
Fire Station used to be The Redback before it was shut down after
complaints, and The Copperfield was about to
lose its licence in a similar situation until Antic stepped in,
encouraged by Lewisham council and police.
Last week's News Shopper published an article detailing how many of
Lewisham borough's pubs have closed in the last 10 years, many of
them failing pubs that are now flats (in an ironic twist, the
Catford Bridge Tavern was named by a councillor as a success story).
And bizarrely, Greenwich Council recently rejected Antic's
application to turn an empty Woolwich centre building into a new
pub. Faced with this trend, why would anyone bother with
regeneration?
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