8 – 9 Margaret’s Buildings, City Centre, Bath

8-9 Margaret’s Buildings are a pair of late 18th century terraced houses, now with commercial ground floors, situated within the Bath conservation area and World Heritage Site. They form part of a local, pedestrianised shopping street with a high concentration of Grade II terraced building, and situated within a significant plan form of connecting Grade I monumental architectural ensembles including the Royal Crescent and the Circus. This application is focused on the commercial treatment of the shop unit at 8 Margaret Buildings, with wider consideration as to eclectic commercial character and pedestrian amenity of the local streetscape.

We note that external seating is already in situ at this location and this application is therefore retrospective.

There are existing premises with outdoor seating along the street which can positively ‘activate’ the public realm. The principle of outdoor seating is therefore not unacceptable, but we do maintain that the site is awkwardly constrained by adjacent seating and a central planter. The addition of further seating may therefore affect the pedestrian amenity of the street and ease of accessibility, and we therefore recommend that any outdoor seating in this area should be appropriately restricted to prevent the ‘overspill’ of tables and chairs and associated cumulative impact on pedestrian movement.