Crunch decisions looms on future of security roller shutters outside Top Town jewellery shop

                                                                       

The shop is located at 22 Victoria Street

COUNCILLORS will next Wednesday (October 4) decide whether jewellery entrepreneur Daniella Draper can retain security roller shutters outside her shop in Grimsby's Top Town.

The recommendation to North East Lincolnshire Council's planning committee is that they should be removed.

States the case officer: "Security concerns must be given weight in the planning balance.

"However, the roller shutters have a detrimental impact on the appearance and character not only on this shopfront but also on the character of the conservation area. 

"The scale and design of the shutters, and their housing, create harsh solid features to the building and street scene. 

"The cumulative impact of the proposal and the small number of other shutters on Victoria Street only emphasise the harsh alien designs of such features contrary to the character of the area."

The Grimsby News says: Despite having Conservation  Area status, this part of the town is scarcely a beauty spot. After the shops close, it is a bleak and somewhat scary place where criminality frequently lurks. To insist that a jewellery shop in such a setting remains unprotected seems like folly. If a brick is put through the window and gems stolen, how would the decision-makers feel? Planning committee members should reject the case officer's recommendation in favour of the shutters' retention.