Lonsdale Cinema in Carlisle could become a car park
Last updated 09:25, Friday, 28 November 2008
Carlisle's former Lonsdale Cinema could be sold again.
The developer eyeing it up plans to demolish the 1930s building in Warwick Road and use the site as a car park with a view to developing it once the economy improves.
That would be a fatal blow to the Save Our Lonsdale group’s hopes of reopening the building as a theatre/arts centre. Any sale, however, depends on the success of an appeal to strip the Lonsdale of its listed-building status so allowing it to be knocked down.
Glenn McDowall, of the Cheshire-based consultancy V&A Projects, is in talks with the Lonsdale’s owner Empera Estates on behalf of the unnamed buyer.
Empera bought the building for £820,000 in 2004 with the aim of demolishing it to make way for 82 apartments.
The decision to list it last year thwarted those redevelopment proposals.
Mr McDowall estimates that the project has already cost Empera around £1.5m with nothing to show for it.
He said: “The listing might have done them a favour. If they had built 82 apartments they might have been in a lot more bother, unable to sell them in the current climate.
“The investors that I represent would knock it down and leave it for five years for the recession to pass. They would probably rent it out as a car park for a few years.”
Mr McDowall said the site could go for offices, shops or other commercial uses. But he doubted whether there was demand for more apartments in Carlisle.
He added: “I wouldn’t have a problem with keeping the building except that, in the current climate, what use is there for 40,000sq ft of sloping floorspace?”
The Lonsdale has stood empty since the cinema closed in 2006.
The Department for Culture, Media and Sport is studying a report on whether the Lonsdale should lose its Grade II listed-building status. Empera argued that the original decision to list it was based on inaccurate information.
An English Heritage adviser re-inspected the Lonsdale this summer.
A decision from Culture Secretary Andy Burnham is expected before Christmas.
Meanwhile, a city council feasibility study into Save Our Lonsdale’s art centre proposals should be published early next year.
Councillor Fiona Robson, chairwoman of the Save Our Lonsdale campaign, told The Cumberland News: “Nothing has changed in that we are still fighting on the basis of the feasibility study for the building. The whole decision on whether we get the building, and get funding, rests on the feasibility study and not whether it is listed or not.”
