Kirstenhof Crime Watch says it is grateful that a local liquor store’s application to sub-council for extended trading days and hours has been turned down.
The application by Liquor City was refused at the Sub-council 20 meeting on Wednesday January 20.
Sub-council manager Richard White said that each year liquor outlets had to renew their applications for the extended trading hours. These let them trade until 8pm, instead of 6pm, from Mondays to Saturdays and from 11am to 6pm on Sundays.
The applications, he said, were usually approved, but the Liquor City one had not been because of the number of objections it had drawn.
The store is on the corner of Main and Chard roads, Kirstenhof, next to a petrol station and car hire company. It has customer parking on the pavement.
Among the objections were two from civic organisations, one from a business and eight from neighbours.
Several residents said extending the trading hours would attract more “unsavoury characters”. They also complained of noise during the week, saying Sunday afternoons were the only quiet time.
Kirstenhof Crime Watch chairman Matthew Campbell said denying the application would greatly reduce noise, crime, parking violations, traffic congestion and anti-social behaviour. “Our resident’s rights to peace and tranquillity are preserved,” he said.
Kirstenhof and Environs Residents’ Association chairwoman Carolynne Franklin said they had objected because the liquor outlet was in a residential area and near homes, a safe house, a nursery school and a swim school for minors.
“History has shown that muggings occur more frequently in this road than many others in the suburb, and boundary walls are used as public urinals. Off-loading of large quantities of liquor takes place at all hours of the day and night,” she said.
Manuel George Calaca, regional manager of the Liquor City Group in the province, said he was unaware that the application for extended trading hours had been refused. The store could not be held responsible for what happened outside its premises, he said.
“The store has been there over 50 years, before many of the residents were born, or moved in,” he said.