| Topic: | Re::Re:Morrison's closing June 1st | |
| Posted by: | Guy Lambert | |
| Date/Time: | 22/01/18 12:42:00 |
| Just to set things slightly straighter. Morrisons lease their store and the previous landlords (an insurance company, I believe) sold the site to a new landlord some while ago. Their current lease has an end date in June/July this year. The landlords can do what they like with the lease - extend it by agreement with Morrisons or terminate it. This is not in the council's gift at all. The new landlord trades as Essential Living and is in the business of providing professionally managed private rental homes. It is owned by M3 Capital Partners which seems to be a major global property conglomerate. As many will be aware, they applied for and were granted planning permission last year (Brentford Councillors dissenting) to demolish the existing store and build a new, somewhat bigger one plus some other smaller retail stores/cafes etc, with a car park and several storeys of flats above. At present, my understanding is that this proposal to redevelop has still to be finally approved by LBH/GLA - the planning application is still listed as 'in progress' on the LBH Planning portal. As of Saturday the staff in Morrisons have no notification of plans to close (I asked them), though obviously rumours abound. The council is seeking clarification from both the developers and Morrisons' senior management. As to the Ballymore development: there was a public enquiry into the proposed Compulsory Purchase late last year. The inspector has sent his report to the Secretary of State and it will apparently take the SoS 8 to 12 weeks to reach a decision. The whole process has taken years, which is intensely frustrating for everybody, but planning permission is in place for the majority of the redevelopment south of the High Street including the 90+ new council homes which are part of the plans. |