Petty planning rules stifle new business

Planning matters are seldom made of the stuff that sets the pulses racing, but we have to say that we were moved by the case reported in last week's local papers.
It concerns an enterprising young businessman who converted a former hairdresser's shop in Dolphin Lane into a smoothie bar some nine months ago, and who, since then has been doing rather well, with 8,000 customers coming through the door, and no apparent complaints of problems with the neighbours.
Perhaps naively, he imagined that as the building had formerly been a shop, that using it as a milk bar would be ... well ... continuing to use it as a shop, and so failed to apply for planning permission for change of use - solely, he says, due to inexperience as a first time business owner.
But he bargained without Boston Borough Council's planners and and the awesome policies G1 and RTC7 of the Boston Borough Local Plan and G1 and RTC5 of the Boston Borough Interim Plan (Non-statutory Development Control Policy (February 2006).
Now, having complied with the rules and applied for retrospective permission, he has - as you might somehow have expected - been turned down, and unless an appeal against the decision succeeds, his shop will close and his small staff will find themselves out of work.
The only thing that makes us laugh in all of this is the ruling by the planners, which says: "The change of use from a class A1 to a class A3 use further reduces the already depleted retail character of one of the town centre's 'other prime shopping frontages,' as identified in the Adopted Local Plan and 'other main shopping frontages' as identified in the Interim Plan. The development is detrimental to the viability and vitality of the town centre and is contrary to policies G1 and RTC7 of the Boston Borough Local Plan and G1 and RTC5 of the Boston Borough Interim Plan (Non-statutory Development Control Policy (February 2006.)"
We struggle to imagine in what way the retail "character" of Dolphin Lane might be further depleted by the arrival of a milk bar.
Depletion is in the eye of the beholder, and in recent times Boston's planners have allowed a slew of shops offering services connected with improving our looks to the extent that if you include the barber's shop and the scent shop, there are no fewer than six such outlets in the lane.
Granted, there are already two cafe-style outlets, but one of those is recent, and apparently caused planners no angst.
What does that leave, a pet shop, an estate agent, a side window of an outdoor goods store and the side wall of a less than salubrious pub.
Not much to merit the grand title of " prime shopping frontages" is it?
Not long ago, Boston Borough Council was trumpeting its big plans for helping improve the town centre.
Unfortunately, they turned out to be nothing more than throwing £30,000 of a £53,000 government grant at creating yet another charity shop, and blowing £12,000 on window stickers to blot out the unsightly interiors of the depressing number of empty shops.
Now the borough plans to create one more empty shop and to add a few more names to the roll of the town's unemployed over what is nothing more than a petty technicality.
If the quality of Dolphin Lane's shops is "depleted," it is entirely because of planning permissions previously granted by a department that probably now - for reasons most likely of pique - is seeking to crush a burgeoning business. And to suggest that a service attracting thousands of customers is "detrimental to the viability and vitality of the town centre" is nothing more than rubbish and a complete reversal of the truth.
Doubtless in their mind's eye, the planners think of Dolphin Lane as a rival to The Shambles in York.
Well, it is a shambles, that's for sure, and it's their fault to boot.
We need to be smoothing the path for people who want to bring new business ideas to the town ... not stifling them.

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