Thatcham “eyesore” building goes up for sale

The building in High Street, which has been empty for five years, is to be sold due to lack of finances

A DERELICT building in Thatcham, for which plans for three retail units and 10 flats fell through owing to lack of finance, has been put up for sale instead.

Five years ago Newbury-based Blue Sky Apartments was given permission to develop the site at the former ATS tyre and exhaust centre in High Street.

However, owing to a floundering economy, years of delays followed and the project never got under way.

The company director of Blue Sky Apartments, John McCusker, said that he was selling up because the firm could not get any bank funding for the development.

He said: “Unfortunately that's the way the market is – people are having difficulty finding finance.”

Jackie Hawkins, who owns the adjacent property Charles Hairdressing, said that after five years of neglect the condition of the building had deteriorated and that it was full of pigeon mess, and many of the windows were broken.

She said: “I hate it; it's an eyesore.

“It makes this end of town look pretty awful.”

She said that she had thought the plans for the site looked very promising and was now hoping to see another development go ahead.

“It cannot be any worse,” she added.