Location
76 Chancery Lane, London
Client
Chilango
Project
Chilango Restaurant
Chilango Restaurant
In 2010, multi-award winning Mexican Restaurant chain, Chilango, instructed Pegasus Planning to appraise and submit an application for a location in Chancery Lane. The site had been used as ancillary storage space for an optician (Class A1 use) but had become vacant. Chilango were keen to change the use of the premises to Class A3 with ancillary A5 use. This would allow them to open a restaurant and takeaway serving burritos to the lunchtime and early evening market.
Pegasus Planning advised that although the site was in a slightly secondary location, Camden Council defined it as within a Central London Retail Frontage; therefore stringent criteria were applied to changes of use, in particular the balance of retail to non-retail uses. This was further complicated by a number of large cleared development sites within the frontage which impacted on the balance of uses. Pegasus successfully argued that the planning permissions that were extant at these development sites which had retail uses on the ground floor should be included in the frontage calculations, increasing the proportion of retail uses. This meant that Chilango’s change of use was compliant with the Council’s policy for change of use. Other issues that were negotiated with the Council included the illuminated signage on an historic shopfront, as well as the location of air-conditioning units and extraction ducting and their impact on listed residential buildings used by the legal profession over-looking the rear of the premises. This ultimately led to an Officer recommendation of approval and Members approved the applications at Planning Committee.
