A new lease of life is being granted to a Sandown High Street property by an Island firm, which hopes to kickstart the town’s regeneration.
The building which previously housed the Sandown Chef Fish and Chip Shop and Sandown Kebab Shop, on the corner of the High Street and York Road, has caught residents’ attention as scaffolding has been erected.
The shop has been empty for the last few years and been one of many properties campaigners have called to fix up.
But, what is happening now?
Planning permission was granted in December 2019 for MCM Construction to rejuvenate the empty and increasingly run-down property into a restaurant with five two-bed flats above it.
Comments were submitted at the time saying the site was important to the Sandown Conservation Area and any development should add some positive visual improvement.
There were concerns the designs were not sympathetic to the High Street as the shop front was ‘too plain’ and ‘modern’, and Isle of Wight Council planning officers recommended the plans be turned down.
They said the rear extension would have a serious adverse impact on the amenities and living conditions of neighbouring property occupiers.
The council’s planning committee, however, unanimously overturned officers’ advice and agreed to the plans, installing a condition that the materials used on the exterior of the property should be agreed upon as it was in a conservation area.
Earlier this year, the council agreed in part to some of the materials that could be used but there remained some surfaces which had yet to be agreed.
Now an update to the project, which sits opposite the Ocean Hotel and across from the Old Corner Bank, has been given by MCM.
Managing director, Brendan McMahon, said work started before the pandemic, after struggling to get permission for seven years.
However, it halted due to Covid-19 due to other building projects before restarting recently.
The rear of the building has been demolished and rebuilt to provide space for three of the flats, with the other two above the shop at the front of the building.
Work restarted in May this year, and Mr McMahon hopes it will be completed by Christmas.
The scaffolding erected will be used to re-roof the property, install new windows and paint the external walls.
Mr McMahon said:
“Hopefully this will help to provide a kick start for other businesses in Sandown and help in the much-needed regeneration of the High Street.”
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