Published Date: Mar 14th, 2025
St Andrews will retain its outdoor seating arrangements at cafés, bars and restaurants as councillors agree to make pavement build outs permanent.
Councillors on North East Planning Committee agreed on Wednesday to make permanent alterations to the pavements in South Street by granting planning permission for five different applications. Each application relates to a different area of temporary build out, which will now be made permanent.
The areas were originally introduced in 2021 to allow businesses to continue serving the public, while maintaining a degree of social distancing. At that time the council temporarily extended the footway width, at five different locations on South Street, to allow tables and chairs to be placed on the pavements.
Cllr Jonny Tepp, Convenor of North East Fife Planning Committee said: "These outdoor seating arrangements have been in place since 2021 and are very popular in the town. However, the current arrangements were always only temporary and as such they are a mix or bollards and planters marking off the areas. The decisions today, to make these build outs from the pavements permanent, mean that we can now create spaces which will look far more attractive.
"St Andrews is a beautiful town with large parts of it a conservation area. The pavement extensions will be built with Caithness stone to blend in with the surrounding areas and create a more uniform and aesthetic look."
It was pointed out at committee that these areas have been in place for four years now and recent local area economic profiles show that St Andrews town centre is thriving.
Each application attracted between 20 and 25 objections but following a debate, councillors on Wednesday agreed that the plans could proceed.
Councillor Tepp continued: “ I think the right decision for St Andrews has been made today. The leisure and tourism sector is one of the town’s key employers and vital to keeping the economy strong.
"These outdoor spaces have proven very popular with locals and tourists. Some of the objections focussed on the loss of 40 car parking spaces in South Street but parking is not a material consideration in relation to these planning applications. It was noted that the town centre still has a large number of on street parking spaces with a number of free car parks within easy walking distance of the shops. The permanent works will include new disabled parking and bike stands.
“There have been a number of questions and legal points raised around this application but councillors agreed these were all answered satisfactorily and the plans were approved. This is a significant investment in St Andrews town centre and I look forward to seeing these improvements in South Street."
It should be noted that a large public consultation had previously been carried out to see what support there was for these spaces to be made permanent. The results of the survey showed that 46% of respondents were in favour of retaining the additional pedestrian spaces, versus 42% that wanted these spaces removed. Additionally, 12% were in favour of keeping some of the implemented zones. These results were reported to the North East Fife Area Committee on 26th April 2023 and they agreed these extensions could remain. Roads & Transportation Service were instructed at that point to advance design work to make these spaces permanent.
