A public hearing into a row between Greenwich Council and the owner of the Trafalgar Tavern pub over its expansion of its beer garden onto the Thames Path will begin next week.
The council served an enforcement notice at the end of March demanding that tables and chairs should be cleared from the ramp at the end of Park Row and the bend in the riverside walk outside the pub – a specific area known as the Ramp and Knuckle.
In the notice, the council said the tables, chairs and umbrellas blocked the pavement and views of the riverside, breaking planning laws in a world heritage site and blocking the highway. The notice did not apply to the fenced-off area outside the pub’s front door.
The owner, Trafalgar Tavern (Lease) Ltd, has appealed against the notice, and a public hearing will begin on Tuesday at 10am at Woolwich Town Hall. The Greenwich Wire understands that the hearing is expected to last two days.
Members of the public can attend the hearing and give evidence.
Last year, the pub lost a little-reported appeal against Greenwich’s refusal in 2021 of an application to use the Ramp and Knuckle for eating and drinking.
This time, the pub can count national newspapers on its side: the Daily Express lambasting “Nimby neighbours”, the Daily Mail branding Greenwich a “killjoy council” and the Daily Telegraph complaining that Angela Rayner had failed to step in.
Even the Conservative shadow communities secretary, Kevin Hollirake, made a social media video with the pub’s owner, Frank Dowling, backing the him in the row with the council.
Dowling told the BBC last month: “I don’t think there’s a problem, because there’s a 5ft walkway. So maybe there is the minor inconvenience of walking around someone.”
The pub has claimed 70 jobs depend on the appeal.
Greenwich’s opposition Conservative leader, Matt Hartley, has also taken up the pub’s cause, telling a council meeting last month: “The Trafalgar Tavern is one of the best pubs in London, nevermind just Greenwich. Countless Greenwich residents and visitors enjoy the outdoor space every day – and it would be ridiculous for Labour-run Greenwich Council to put all that to an end, with significant job losses for the pub, if this enforcement action goes ahead.
“We need some common sense from Labour councillors on this one – not something local residents have come to expect, sadly.”
Last week, at another meeting, Hartley asked Majid Rahman, the council’s cabinet member for planning, if the council had learned anything from the row: “Why has it reached this point with a pub which is such an important contributor to the visitor economy in Greenwich? Does he think on reflection he should have got involved directly, engaged, visited, and what has he learned?”
Rahman said: “Our officers work hard to make sure that residents’ public realm is protected. And this is key: upholding the law and making sure that we do everything we can to make sure that our residents’ interests are kept up. I won’t say anything more to that, but it’s not necessarily a lesson to be learned. It’s more about understanding how hard our officers work.”
The council has been careful not to comment directly about the case, but Aidan Smith, a Labour councillor for Greenwich Park, took a jab at the intervention of Hartley – who represents Mottingham, Coldharbour and New Eltham, in the south of the borough – in the same meeting.
He asked Rahman if he agreed that “while we strongly support local businesses, everyone has to follow the rules of planning? Or does the cabinet member agree with the leader of the opposition that private interests should trump the public interest? I think the views expressed by the leader of the opposition go to show why his party does not represent the residents of the north of the borough, either literally or metaphorically.”
Last year both Hartley and the Labour council leader Anthony Okereke criticised the “culture war” row over a west Greenwich chip shop being told to remove a Union Jack mural. The Golden Chippy, which is in a conservation area, later painted over the design.
Edited on August 1 to link to the correct documents in the case about the 2021 ruling.
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