Complaint about tables on the pavement outside cafes

Not trying to be negative but sometimes it has to be addressed…
It seem Grounds Grapes do not have permission to hog the pavement with extending your tables and chairs.
This is a public footpath and it’s not owned by you to action this sorry to say!!
I tried to speak to someone a few times at Grounds Grapes someone said it was down to his boss.
This is unfair and out of line the council have been made aware and its being chased up. This applies to all shops on any high street.

*****Please don’t assume I want the business or another business to do badly I don’t.
I get people need to make a living and by finding ways to do this shows creativity. But sometimes the lines get crossed or blurred in the excitement and lack of surroundings get overlooked.
Busy or not this is obstruction of a public pavement.
Maybe a bigger venue is required to accommodate a service doing very well.

It’d be a good idea for the council to turn the car parking spaces on honour oak high street into the footpath, thereby creating space for business to use the pavement, or vice versa.
This may be an old image but surely there is space for some tables as well as pedestrians if the cars were just moved.

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Do you know that they don’t have permission? You can apply for a pavement license via Lewisham council that would permit this and I’d surprised if they didn’t have one. I seem to recall you making a similar complaint about this last year so clearly a topic you’re very concerned about. Have you raised with the council?
I walk past Grounds & Grapes several times a day and haven’t experienced or witnessed any issues with being able to get by.
Do be mindful that being able to operate at reasonable capacity outside could be the difference between staying afloat or going under at the moment.

I think the issue will be they cannot serve anyone indoors, so need to maximise outdoor space. License or not, if there is still room for people in wheelchairs, those with prams etc to get past I’d be happy for them to keep their outside space.

Is there no room for people.to get past in these situations?

By allowing (or more accurately insisting) that bars and restaurants open outside only, then encroachments on pavements become very likely, given many businesses simply need to trade to survive. It would have been better in my view to have allowed indoors and outdoors to open at same time (even if that meant a delay).

Honor oak is a busy road. Sadly this idea wouldn’t really work shame. Each food or drink place should have stud markings to show how far out they can go without breaching. Thanks for responding back a sharing.

Thanks for responding back understandable when it’s not busy this point doesn’t help.
But when it does and it has caused issues sadly. I and a few others did witness this last year.

Thank you so much for responding so true it has been tough all round. It is tricky situation but still a public footpath despite it being busy or not if action is not taken then anyone can do what they like when. This then will become or can become a bigger issue.
Not everyone will witness everything all of the time or appreciate and be understanding.

This just doesn’t look like an issue to me…

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Looks fine to me too, also last time I was in the area I saw that there was a pavement on the other side of the road too…

I’m quite excited they are finally open again - I’ve been wanting to try their coffee for months!!

As a taxpayer, personally, I’d rather not pay for the delay in reducing furlough costs that that would imply.

I would have thought this easy to find on Lewisham.gov.uk, but 15+ minutes of looking suggests otherwise (I didn’t find ANY indication there is a record of pavement licenses for ANY businesses on their site)

Westminster City Council have closed several roads in order to make space for outdoor restaurants. I think it looks very pleasant. Much better than the pubs where their customers take up all the pavement and force pedestrians into the road.

Yes there are a few nice examples around. Parts of Brick Lane were also pedestrianised, as was Northcote Road and Bedford Hill.

But if it’s not possible to fully pedestrianise a street there are other examples of pavement widening that could work for HOP to allow hospitality to trade outdoors.

This is borough high street.

Lordship Lane has also been widened in parts by some less fancy regular orange plastic barriers which while not pretty could be a good temporary fix because indoor trading is set to commence in a few weeks anyway.

It seemed fine to me yesterday too, the bigger issue I have have with pavement space is further up the road, where cars are given priority over pedestrians, making it unusable for people with prams, and I presume those with mobility issues too.

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I can’t get my head around it as most of the houses up there have driveways and there is parking for the cemetery too. I wrote to the council recently to see if they can do anything, we shall see!

Wheelie bins too! Our Council has a lot to answer to. Far too much pavement clutter and the pavements are in a dangerous state of disrepair too, making it really hazardous for those with sensory or mobility issues.

Part of the trouble with pavement cafes is that when people are seated, they don’t stay nailed to the spot. They have buggies and dogs and staff come to the tables to take orders and deliver food. So imagine trying to run the gauntlet of that if you can’t see or can’t walk unaided.

Yes! The combo of wheelybins and cars up there is the worst. I agree with you on tables etc too, so I hope cafes can make sure they’re used in a considerate way, but at least in the case of cafes I can see wider community/economic value as part of the costs/benefits, whereas with cars and bins blocking pavements outside of empty driveways I think it’s often just selfishness.

This looks fine to me, and good for them maximising what little space they have available, enabling distancing, and still with consideration to the public right of way.

Perhaps attention could be turned to Perry Vale, where the narrow pavement is consistently blocked with wheelie bins?

Yep it’s terrible in Taymount Rise. I often have to walk in the road.

I’ve taken it upon myself to do some reconnaissance and can confirm the pavement is nice and clear and the coffee is tasty.

Good stuff - it looked ok in photos to me also, do you think it would still be ok with all tables occupied and chairs obviously then not pushed in? I hope so but if not the initial concerns raised might be valid.

Yeah even with people seated the pavement is broad enough. In an ideal world would like to see the parking bays commandeered for some more space, it really is nice when the sun’s out and donde, grounds and grapes, two spoons etc all have people outside.

That’s good to hear. I agree, people eating outside is great to see, and do!

I’m not sure how much pressure there is on those parking bays, and there are certainly some areas that could be considered for pavement widening like the area outside Marvelous Beans / Querce etc.

I wondered if the businesses would support that or not. I guess the parking spaces are also loading bays for the shops, and without those, Honor Oak Park could be blocked by deliveries. I also wouldn’t like to sit right next to the road while I enjoy my coffee, but a nice cycle lane, or green verge with some planting could also be nice. I’ll keep dreaming for now

Fantastic to hear.

I don’t think there’s anything better at the moment than seeing our local businesses opening back up and people enjoying what they have to offer. There’s plenty of room in the current seating situation and most importantly it is allowing a small business to open

Its just a shame the weather has turned so chilly this week!
I had my lunch outside a local cafe today and despite being clad in a sweater and a coat actually didn’t enjoy it at all because it was so cold.
I remember this time last year during the first lockdown the weather was lovely.
this year I’m still wearing winter clothes!

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Our booking for tomorrow was cancelled. Apparently they were visited by somekind of “covid police” (not quite sure what the official term is hence the speechmarks). And there isn’t enough space on the pavement to be covid-safe, so they’ve now gotta go takeaway only, I guess for the meantime.

Quite a shame, I walk past this cafe a lot and in my opinion it has never been an issue with space on the pavement. I guess there are covid regulations, but I’m sure these are broken in many other places, so sad to see this cafe targeted.

I really hope no-one has taken the petty step of reporting them for ‘breaching’ regulations (which I honestly can’t see that they’ve done) while Soho and Shoreditch are being allowed to get away with chronic over-crowding.

I guess the footfall in the centre of town is worth more £££ to the local authorities than the little local cafes. What a disappointment for a small business to be allowed to open up only to have their wings immediately clipped.

That’s such a shame, I hope they encourage the council to turn the parking bays into a walkway to allow more space, seems mad that we have a high street that accommodates parking on both sides but without space for a cafe to have a table out the front.

It could be as simple as the Council wanting their fee for a pavement licence, which is kinda fair if other businesses have applied and paid the same, noting Donde next door still have tables (and menus!) out.

To be clear I don’t know what l that G&G don’t or haven’t applied for a licence already, though it does seem a bit mean spirited of the council not to allow them a bit of the space providing it is safe and a pavement licence is applied for.

I also noticed that Grounds and Grapes hadn’t yet opened this morning when I passed, and Google Places now shows it as ‘temporarily closed’. I hope they haven’t changed their mind about re-opening

I would just remove on or two of the parking spaces and have ‘pocket park seating’.

Electric scooters and cyclists on the footpath are a far bigger problem. You can,t get knocked over by someone sitting down having a drink! Add the randomly placed A boards and mopeds parking on the footpath picking up takeaways, you’ll then see there are far more important issues regarding keeping them clear for the intended purpose. Not just Honor Oak but almost everywhere.

The Pavement Police have now been to Moustache on Kirkdale and asked them to submit a Pavement License. I know nothing about this, but apparently this is a TFL owned street which usually the council do not have any powers over because, well, TFL…

Apparently it is possible to write to the council and support their application by emailing them.

There are chairs and tables all over Southwark on roads like Lordship Lane that have narrower pavements to begin with.

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Interesting how this one venue seems to have been mentioned both here and visited by an enforcement officer. Yet the Sainsbury’s queue which forms outside at least two other businesses and the same for the Post Office go amiss. Fully appreciate peoples perspective on the “necessity” of each but two are large public companies and the other is a local business. Shame it’s come to this and hopefully they can open again in the near future.

My stance is generally sympathetic to the business owners, who are only trying to get a living.
Okay, the licence is another bit of red tape, but I guess Lewisham does have a responsibility for public safety on its streets, which is catered for by the requirement for £5M public liability insurance (normally included in a business premises insurance package).
And, as the licence fee appears only to be £100, it’s not prohibitive.

We will see if the council approves the license, but they have already banned them from putting tables and chairs outside.

I agree, and Sainsbury’s often has loads of storage cages outside too. I’ve noticed grounds and grapes hasn’t reopened since last week, I hope they’ll be able to open again soon.

From the link @Anotherjohn posted, a pavement licence is required for placing temporary furniture outside for the purpose of selling food and drink. It doesn’t apply to people just queuing outside businesses, services, schools etc…

But I can’t help but feel it should made just a box ticking exercise to get a pavement licence right now. If council staff are visiting businesses, can’t they just take pictures and put some (red) tape on the ground to mark the area while the business fills out a form and pays the fee and then everyone calls it done for a year?

Agree! due to the current situation Councils should do a blanket rule that cafe’s may place tables on the pavement provided there is a sufficient measurement left to allow pedestrians and those in wheelchairs or with buggies to pass safely

Ideally yes, but for liability purposes I imagine there probably has to be a risk assessment of some kind carried out by the council and recorded somewhere.

Also, isn’t there already a blanket rule for pubs? #bringablanket

There is a sign up in their window now saying Ground and Grapes are reopening on the 18th May, I assume mostly or exclusively inside.

Good to hear. I’ll be going back and spending all my money there to help them out, because I don’t think this shutdown was fair.

As far as I know they were not ‘shutdown’. They didn’t have the required licence and decided they would prefer not to trade rather than get the licence or operate as takeaway only.

I still think the Council should have fast-tracked licences, but I seem to recall G&G purposefully took their time when first opening too (e.g. Grounds and Grapes - #23 by Anotherjohn). I think they do things how they like - and good for them!

There is also a sign showing their application for a pavement licence, dated April 4th (noting this topic started April 14th):

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I’m really looking forward to them re-opening though, as there isn’t any really good coffee that I can find in that stretch of Honor Oak Park. I’ve had some above average coffee at On The Hoof in the station, but to get something good you have to go all the way down to Rise Cafe at the bottom. Rise Cafe probably ranks in my top 3 for flat whites in SE23, and Marvellous Greens & Beans is pretty good too.

Two Spoons by the station isn’t bad at all for coffee

Maybe relevant for others: