NEW plans have been submitted to continue the demolition of a former popular Italian restaurant.

A planning application originally emerged in January 2019 to demolish parts of the Chianti Italian restaurant, in Chorley Old Road, close to Moss Bank Way, to extend the restaurant and create more business.

However, plans then appeared in July 2019 to demolish all the buildings to erect a whole new restaurant, but these plans were then withdrawn by the applicant later that year.

The site has been sitting vacant ever since with new plans submitted again to amend the original application made in January 2019 to demolish just the garage, and instead take down all the remaining buildings to build a new restaurant.

The documents within these applications make it clear that the process has been made more complicated by a change in planning agents during the process.

A planning statement by the planning agents, Form Architects, says: “A very dull and architecturally and uninspiring building with no architectural merit will be replaced by a new modern building that is compatible with the surrounding land usage and occupiers.”

Ward councillor Roger Hayes said it was a big miss when the original restaurant closed down as it was much loved by himself and many local residents.

He also said that there was some concern around the site when demolition first started as residents were concerned it could be made into flats close to what is considered green belt land.

However, he would fully support the site becoming a restaurant for the local area again.

He said: “We’re going to be putting leaflets through residents' doors in the coming days to let people know that a new plan has been submitted.

“They originally just intended to extend the building but I think they found problems with it quite early on and had to pull it all down.

“There were also seemed to be some communication problems between the applicant and the council with developers changing and Covid-19 would have caused a lot of setbacks.”

Despite the delay, bringing the site back into use as a restaurant was welcomed by Cllr Hayes.

He said: “I think it will generally be welcomed by most and locals will be pleased to see it back.

“We used to go there a lot of Friday nights to Chianti and it was always lovely.

“I think this would be putting it back into good use, to be used by the community again and I would be quite supportive of the new plans.

“It was well used by local people, who used to walk there from their houses close by which is why it was a shame when it closed down originally.”

A decision is expected to be made by the council by the end of October.