SAVE THE ALLIANCE     Contact: nick@savethealliance.org last update 20 October 2020

Home

Our Docs

Other Docs

The Alliance Pub at 40-42 Mill Lane, London NW6 1NR was up for sale in 2016 and, following local concerns about it disappearing as a pub, an application for a registration of an Asset of Community Value (ACV) was made by Fortune Green and West Hampstead Neighbourhood Development Forum (The NDF). The ACV was awarded in early 2016, for a period of five years.

There is currently no obvious risk to the pub, apart from Covid, in fact the current freeholder is keen on the pub, but to maintain the pubs protected status...

WE NOW NEED TO APPLY FOR A NEW REGISTRATION AS AN ASSET OF COMMUNITY VALUE.

To support this we must rerun the survey we took in 2016 to gather comments from the local community showing that the Alliance is invaluable to the local community, over and above being just a pub. Please help by spending a few minutes to fill in the survey, the link to which is below. All comments/answers will be anonymous, as will the participants. The number of responses is important so please check that your friends have also done the survey.

Please fill in the survey here

A Short History

Several days before we were awarded the ACV the pub was sold with the tenancy intact and and the pub continued operating. The ACV protected the ground floor and basement as a pub. The new owners quickly applied (May 2016)for planning permission to convert the upper floors into five flats. They then put it on the market again and eventually it was sold in 2017/2018. The new owner applied to extend the upstairs development to 7 flats but planning permission was refused. Around this time the owner contacted the NDF to discuss his proposals. He then reapplied to add a mansard roof (moved back from the frontage) containing two studio flats which were added to the previously approved 5 bedroom scheme. The application which also included improvements to the exterior of the existing building was approved, with support of the NDF, in June 2019, on the basis that it would help the viability and survival of the pub.

What is an ACV?

Camden's website offers the following description. "Community groups can ask the council to list land or a building as an asset of community value. If the asset goes up for sale, the community are offered 6 months to develop a proposal and raise money to bid for it. This is known as the 'community right to bid'. Designation as an ACV does not, however, restrict who owners can sell to or at what price. It also does not affect an owner's ability to seek planning permission to change the use or redevelop a property after it has been designated. Once an asset has been placed on the Council's list of ACVs it will usually remain there for five years".

Getting our new ACV

For the previous application for an ACV we undertook a survey of friends and customers of the pub of their views about the pub, and in particular its value to the community apart from being an excellent pub. The survey was vital for success and went down well with the Camden Planning Department. We retained the list of email addresses of the previous survey responders (having asked them) and will contact them for their support again. 600 out of 800 email addresses appear to still be valid.

But we need more supporters and we hope and believe that there are many newcomers to the Alliance who will want to preserve it and we implore them to participate in the survey.