Developers behind a Leon drive-thru in Harrogate have put up another advertising sign before permission to do so has been granted.
Pictures from the Wetherby Road site show a sign for the restaurant, which will serve healthy fast food, being placed on top of the building this morning. The sign is one-metre tall and the lettering lights up red.
Euro Garages has applied for the installation of 15 advertising boards, which include drive-thru directions, menus and a height restrictor bar.
But Harrogate Borough Council has yet to approve the application.
A spokesperson for the council said:
“We are aware of the signage and are considering what action may be required.”
The move comes just three weeks after the developer erected an eight-metre tall sign outside the drive-thru.
Council officials ordered the sign be taken down and warned that any work undertaken on advertising signage before an application was approved would be at the developer’s “own risk”.
Euro Garages declined to comment.
Concern over Leon design
Local residents have raised concern that the building on the site will be different from that which was approved.
Initially, approval was granted for the site to become a Starbucks — but it has since emerged that the drive-thru will instead be a Leon.
Residents raised concern when it became clear that the design of the building was not the same as that lodged to the council.
Joe Shields, who lives next to the site and is a former marketing manager for companies including fast-food chains, told the Stray Ferret:
“I have opened a few drive-thrus, I’m not against them.
“It is opening a drive-thru here which is nuts.”
Read more:
- Harrogate council to pay Leon developer £25,000 in appeal costs
- No conditions for Wetherby Road drive-thru to be a Starbucks, says council
- Council orders Harrogate Leon developer to remove advertising sign
Harrogate Borough Council has acknowledged that the building being constructed is not the same as the designs submitted to the authority.
However, it added that the developer has already submitted another application for the design, which is under consideration.
The drive-thru has long proved contentious since it was granted permission by a government planning inspector last year.
Last month, the Stray Ferret reported that Harrogate Borough Council had agreed to pay £25,000 in costs to Euro Garages following the appeal hearing.
Helen Hockenhull, the planning inspector, awarded costs against the council after she said it “demonstrated unreasonable behaviour”.
