An appeal has been launched after a bid to turn a Barrhead cafe into a Chinese takeaway was turned down by council planners.
The applicant, Amy Li, asked East Renfrewshire Council for permission to convert an empty unit at 196 Cross Arthurlie Street, but planning officials rejected the proposal.
They decided too many takeaways in the area would have a “significant impact on residential amenity by means of odour nuisance, noise and disturbance”.
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However, an appeal has now been submitted which urges councillors on the council’s local review body to reconsider. It suggests a one-year monitoring period for “odour discharge”.
The takeaway would create seven jobs, the applicants, who “operated a similar business in Baillieston for five years”, have said. They are now “seeking to run a business nearer to their home address”.
Councillors are set to visit the site before meeting to consider the appeal on Wednesday afternoon.
Plans to convert the unit, part of a group of four shops at the junction of Cross Arthurlie Street with Carlibar Road, were submitted in August last year, but it was rejected in December.
It is the second application to open a takeaway on the site after a bid was rejected in June 2022. At that point, officials also ruled the use would result in “significant odour nuisances, noise and disturbance”.
They believed this would “erode the mixed commercial character of the area” and said the position of the proposed extract flue would affect the “occupants of the closest properties”.
When the second application was launched, environmental health officers reported they had “reservations regarding the proposal for a ventilation system with a low level discharge compared to the height of the adjacent three-storey tenement building”.
They said the cooking odour from the proposed takeaway “is likely to cause odour nuisance to the residents of the three-storey flats”.
Planning officials once again rejected the plan, deciding that three hot food takeaways “from 168 Cross Arthurlie Street to 6 Carlibar Road” would be too many.
“The cumulative impact of those hot food takeaways would have a significant impact on residential amenity by means of odour nuisance, noise and disturbance,” they reported.
They also decided the extract flue would be too close to nearby flats.
The applicants have argued they do not believe there would be an “excessive” number of takeaways. In an appeal statement, they said a survey of retail premises approximately 400 metres from the proposed takeaway found 31 units, of which four would be hot food outlets.
It added the cooking style is “not regarded as high odour” but a “high odour control system” would be installed. “We had hoped this would allay the concerns of the Environmental Health service.”
The statement also said the applicants believe the takeaway would “not impact to any extent on the background noise” as there are busy roads and a railway nearby.
They pointed out there are no objections from neighbouring residents and said they would be ““happy to change the position of the flue discharge to eight metres from the nearest building instead of the existing four and a half metres”.
“We would also accept a monitoring period for odour discharge complaints of one year should planning permission be granted,” the statement added.
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