Landmark auction house could be demolished

A planning application which would see the demolition of Kidderminster Market Auctions in Comberton Place has been submitted to Wyre Forest District Council.

If the go-ahead is given, the application could see 39 affordable homes built on the site.

The auction house currently deals with the sale of carpets, plants, fresh produce, antiques, furniture and jewellery, as well as other items.

Its closure would mark the end of an era on the site.

Richard Banks, a director of Kidderminster Market Auctions, said: "The problem with the site is that it requires enormous investment to continue trading. We have an agent applying for planning permission.

"If we obtain planning permission it would have a life of three years so that there is no rush to decide what will happen.

"We have considered alternative sites but no decision has yet been made.

"The present concrete building is a 1950s building. It is too big and it is in a poor state.

"We need to wait to see if planning permission is given and then decide what will happen.

"We haven't discussed the future."

Kidderminster Market Auctions is all that remains of the town's once thriving cattle market.

Wyre Forest District Council struck a deal to sell the town's former livestock market site to a housing developer for £2 million in 2002.

The sale completed the disposal of the whole of the former cattle market complex.

Kidderminster Market Auctions' building was sold to sitting tenants.

The twice weekly livestock market closed in January 1998 after operating on the site for 38 years.

Before that it had been in Market Street in the town centre for many years.