A “Chai Village” that was built without planning permission in 2022 is finally being demolished – over eight months after the owners were ordered to clear the site.
Plans for a new café on a site off Thornton Road were first proposed in Summer 2021. By the time the application was refused by Bradford Council in 2022, the development had already been built.
Since then, five attempts to gain retrospective planning permission have failed – the most recent attempt being an appeal by Chai Village LTD that was dismissed in early 2024.
The development was based on a former mill site in the Goitside Conservation Area, on the outskirts of Bradford city centre.
Reasons for refusing the plans included the impact of traffic of the development and concerns about the large screen on the site.
There were also fears that the café was out of keeping with the surrounding Conservation Area, and that allowing it to remain could jeopardise the redevelopment of the strategic site that has previously been earmarked for shops and flats.
Last May Bradford Council issued an enforcement notice ordering the site to be cleared within one month.
That time limit expired in June, but the buildings and large LED screen remained in place. As the months passed the buildings have become increasingly derelict, daubed in graffiti with the site filled with fly tipped waste and parked cars.
This week work to demolish the buildings and remove the huge screen from the site has begun.
The Local Democracy Reporting Service has asked Bradford Council if it was behind the demolition work, or if the owner had agreed to clear the site, but has yet to receive a response.
