A dine-in market creating more than 250 jobs and a hospital expansion have been unanimously approved by Liverpool Council’s planning committee.
Plans to add a three storey extension to the existing A&E and theatre departments at Aintree University Hospital were approved without objection this morning.
Councillors also gave the go-ahead for Manchester-based food and drink operator Mission Mars to open a new food market, named Zumhof Biergarten, in what used to be the Liv Organic and Natural Food Market in Radiant House on Bold Street.
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Committee members were told the expansion of Aintree Hospital would be “critical to the delivery of the hospital’s services” including the provision of specialist emergency stroke care alongside the existing A&E department on the ground floor, with the benefits of adjacencies to the existing radiology and A&E facilities.
It was said the development will provide a “reconfigured and expanded” theatre department, with two new ‘hybrid’ theatres which comprise of real time diagnostic imaging during the operational procedure.
Three new ambulance bays will also be created as part of the new layout, extending the current provision located to the front of the A&E Department off the hospital’s internal circulatory road.
Planning committee chairman, Cllr Tony Concepcion, said he welcomed the application, adding it was “looking after the health of the city.”
Councillors also heard that Mission Mars’ application to renovate Radiant House on Bold Street would provide a “unique opportunity” to develop the site to its potential and provide 266 new jobs as a result.
Having initially hoped to open in 2020, the long empty venue will now operate as a dine-in food market and drinking venue with a range of artisan food spaces and bars serving Bavarian and local beers.
There are also plans for a number of kitchens to be let out to independent food retailers.
This is Mission Mars’ latest venture in the city, having opened the Albert's Shenke Bier Halle and Cook Haus in Hanover Street in 2019.
Planning officer Fergal McEvoy said Radiant House was an “iconic building” with a “really attractive shop front” that had been unoccupied for a number of years.
Mr McEvoy added that there had been a struggle to find a tenant to take all floors of the six-storey building since it was vacated in
The new bar and retail elements of the building will be accessed via Bold Street with further minor changes to the shopfront and the creation of five windows.
Cllr Concepcion, in recommending the scheme be approved, said the new food market would “assist and help Bold Street ensure its viability is maintained.”
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