Flats plan for Bristol pub The Windmill rejected

The future of The Windmill has been in doubt for some time

Plans to turn a pub into flats have been unanimously rejected by councillors after a campaign by local residents.

The Windmill, in South Bristol, has been closed since March 2020.

Since then, the owners put it on the market and tried to get permission to convert the building into five flats.

Local residents said losing the establishment would have been a "travesty" for the Windmill Hill community.

All nine Bristol City councillors voted to reject the plans, with chairperson Councillor Ani Stafford Townsend announcing: "The pub stays as a pub".

Supporters loudly applauded the decision after arguing against the original officer recommendation to approve the application, reported the Local Democracy Reporting Service.

Windmill pub supporters celebrate after councillors rejected plans to turn it into flats

The only person to speak in defence of the proposals was Mike Cranney, director at Bar Wars, which owns the pub, who asked members to look beyond the narrative of "a greedy landlord cashes in while depriving the community".

"There are a very different set of circumstances behind this story, and, indeed, every pub closure in the city," he said.

The owners had originally been granted permission to convert the pub, only for it to be overturned after local residents launched a legal challenge.

Campaigners failed to raise enough money to buy it and accused the owner of deliberately running it down and overpricing it.

Resident Lisa McKeever said: "It would be a travesty and I think we'd feel betrayed as a community in Windmill Hill if the pub didn't reopen again."

Councillor Fabian Breckels said: "That pub is potentially going to turn into a goldmine in the right hands. I'm not convinced that there are enough alternative provisions within safe access for those people in Windmill Hill if we allow this pub to be lost."