Cheshire Cheese plan could be back on the menu
Developers are seeking to renew planning approval to build 10 houses on the site of a demolished pub.
Clutton Homes had been given permission to demolish the Cheshire Cheese in Dawley in October 2020 as long as they did it within three years.
That time limit has elapsed and now Wellington-based Clutton Homes has lodged a planning application to ‘renew’ that approval.
The application again seeks the green light to build 10 dwellings, an access drive, drainage and external works at the site off Doseley Road.
Telford & Wrekin Council has received the application but as of Friday it was still being validated by officials and has not yet been open for public consultation.
The pub was demolished in November 2022 after it closed in early 2019 and fell into dereliction.
“The Cheese is on Fire” – Telford Live January 2020
“Pub on fire. Again” – Telford Live November 2020
This was refused in November 2019, for reasons including the view that the pub was an “important signifier of the area’s industrial past,” particularly in conjunction with the nearby Grade II listed railway bridge which crosses Doseley Road.
The demolition was also thought to have an “adverse impact upon the character of the area,” according to an officers’ report at the time.
The empty building had been hit by arsonists, and planners accepted that demolition was the only option.
“How many times can a pub burn down?” – Telford Live 2024
Local objections to the loss of the pub “are noted,” the officers’ report to councillors said, but they took the lack of interest from buyers to demonstrate “a lack of need.”
Officers said two arson attacks had affected the structural integrity of the building to the point that demolition was the only option.
Despite some local objections, the council gave planning permission in February this year for the pub to be knocked down and replaced by 10 homes.
One of the many objectors to the proposal wrote of the Cheshire Cheese pub standing ‘proud for many years’.
Others complained of too many houses being built in Telford and of the impact on local roads.
Mr Jason Lewis, of Horsehay wrote: “The Cheshire cheese pub has stood proud for many years, it’s an iconic representation of a British pub and our local heritage.
“It’s discrimination to condemn these such dwellings into mere memory and erase their physical presence with new houses that only profit the builders involved.
“There is no benefit to the local community for more house to be effected in such an unnecessary location, only more congestion on our roads, noise on the streets and people into what once was a quite area.
“Too many iconic local building have already been lost to new housing developments.”
In vain he appealed for planners to “take serious consideration against the Cheshire Cheese becoming another memory lost the sea of houses which Telford is fast becoming.”
