Car dealer hopes to build new showroom

The sight of dozens of glistening new Peugeots parked on a grassy verge outside Continental Motors? North Shore Road showroom will be a thing of the past if a Planning application to build a new showroom is successful.

Continental Motors Ltd. this week made an in-principle Planning application for a new car showroom with ancillary service spaces and parking on No. 87, St. John?s Road, Pembroke.

?We will not be parking on the grass any more,? general manager Jeff Sterling said. ?They will be parked inside.?

Continental Motors services Peugeot cars from a service-garage on Curving Avenue.

However, Mr. Sterling said there are no plans at this stage to close the old premises.

?We have not made any solid decisions on what to do with the old properties,? he said. ?We have just put in an application at this stage.?

Mr. Sterling added that the new showroom would be able to display ?quite a few? cars, as well as motorcycles and there would also be room to service ?five or six cars?.

Belco denied permission to build on green space

Belco has been denied Planning permission to build on land with a green space and open space zoning during a recent meeting of the Development Applications Board.

The DAB refused Belco?s in-principle application for a two-bedroom home at 51 North Shore Road.

?The site is zoned entirely Green Space with an Open Space overlay and as such the development of a new dwelling unit is not permitted,? the DAB said in its decision.

It also said Belco?s application failed to conform with Planning rules because ?insufficient information has been submitted to enable a proper assessment of the proposal?.

The Director of Planning Rudolph Hollis said the construction boom has seen a rise in the number of Planning applications, including those on green space.

?We are getting an increase in applications of all types, irrespective of what zones,? he said. ?They are recommended for a quick refusal.?

Mr. Hollis said in the case of the Belco application, the DAB had no discretion to approve the application because residences cannot be built on land zoned as green space.

?Applying to build on green space means an automatic refusal,? he said.