Plans for a pop-up stone baked pizza restaurant in a storage container set up outside the entrance to Didcot’s Sainsbury’s will go under the hammer for a decision by South Oxfordshire District Council next Wednesday.
The temporary pizza restaurant would be assembled next to the amphitheatre-style steps in the Orchard Centre.
Designs show space for tables and seating both inside and outside and a traditional pizza oven.
The planning application was submitted by developers Hammerson, the same developers due to start building work on the £50 million second phase of Didcot’s Orchard Centre shopping centre in the coming months.
The plans state that once the extension to Didcot’s Orchard Centre is finished, the pizza restaurant would move into one of the restaurant units to be built.
South Oxfordshire District Council’s planning officers recommended the plans for approval in a report published on Tuesday.
However Didcot Town Council urged members of SODC’s planning committee to reject the proposal as it is ‘not in keeping with the street scene’.
The structure itself would be adapted and altered from a 9m by 6m storage container as a temporary unit for up to two years.
The report states: “The use of the building will add to the vibrancy of this part of the Orchard Centre. It will bring wider benefits in terms of choice for consumers and have a positive impact on the local economy in both the short term and the long term.”
A decision is to be made by SODC’s committee at The Fountain Conference Centre in Howbery Park, Crowmarsh Gifford, at 6pm next Wednesday, October 21.
