A local café/hot food takeaway has been granted change of use after an appeal by the owner was granted.
Salsa’s Diner at 27 The Square is owned by this year’s Lass, Salsa Porteous. She has endured a long battle after her application for change of use was rejected late last year. However she can now rest after the local review body unanimously overturned the rejection.
At a meeting today at Midlothian Council’s headquarters in Dalkeith, the review body voted in favour of granting change of use from an office to a cafe. They had previously rejected the application after concerns were raised that the addition of an eatery to the town centre may lead to an over provision of cafes and hot food takeaways. However the applicant, Ms Porteous, pointed out that the retail scene in Penicuik had not changed and whilst there was a greater number of vacant retail properties, further change of use applications had not been granted and therefore the number of non-retail properties would not be greater than that of the number of retail properties.
To further complicate the matter Salsa’s Diner had started to operate before permission was granted and therefore a lot of the public came to use the business frequently, with it becoming a part of the many peoples’ everyday lives. Should the appeal not have been overturned, Salsa would have had to watch as a lot of her well spent savings were washed away. Luckily however she can now continue to operate her much loved cafe as normal.
She would like to thank all those who helped to save the business, especially those who signed her petition which achieved just shy of 400 signatures.