Bid to save old Walsall cinema from being converted into flats continues

Lodge Housing Ltd have applied to gain listed building consent to convert The Imperial, on Darwall Street in the town centre, into 21 new apartments and follows a full planning application submitted last year.

But the Cinema Theatre Association said they remain “strongly opposed” to the proposal and want the building to be brought back as a venue.

Lodge Housing Ltd has said it would make very little changes to the exterior of the building and would be bring a vacant site back into use as well as providing much needed affordable housing.

In an ‘options appraisal’ report, Laura Wigg-Bailey of chartered planners Moss Naylor Young said there was a concern The Imperial could go the same way of other historic buildings in the town and end up being torched.

The Imperial was last used as a Wetherspoon pub before it closed in 2016 and it has sat empty ever since.

It was built in 1868 as an agricultural hall before it was redeveloped to become St George’s Hall a few years later.

It became The Imperial Theatre in 1899 before it was converted again as the Imperial Picture House – Walsall’s first cinema – in 1908.

When the cinema closed 60 years later, it was turned into a bingo hall and remained so until 1997 when JD Wetherspoon took it over and reopened it as a pub.

The Grade II Listed venue was added to the National Heritage List for England in 2021.

Ms Wigg-Taylor said her research led to the conclusion there was no longer a demand for the building to be brought back into use as a cinema.

She said: “The risk to the building is manifested in the likelihood of anti-social behaviour and arson attack which has been such a problem in Walsall over the years.

“The site could be viewed as an ideal opportunity to create additional housing,

strengthening the local community by making use of a building, which has lay vacant for approximately five years.

“Evidence suggests there is strong precedent in the UK for development of former cinemas into residential units while retaining the significance of their presence within the historic streetscape.

“The preferred option of residential units for rental was found to be in demand within Walsall.”

The Cinema Theatre Association said: “The CTA remains strongly opposed to the proposed sub-division for residential units described in the planning application last year and in the new Listed Building application recently submitted.

“The Imperial (has been) statutorily Listed. This adds extra weight to our objection.

“The Listing assessment states that ‘The architectural quality of the exterior and the quality of the surviving interior decorative schemes combine with its history and survival to give it clear special interest’.

“We have studied the Options Appraisal but consider that the applicant has not studied the full range of possible uses for the cinema, of which there are many.

“It is essential to find a use which retains the main space of the auditorium interior.

“The Cinema Theatre Association is happy to study and discuss any new proposal which takes seriously the quality of the cinema’s interior and the reasons for its recent Listing.”

When the plan emerged last year, both the Theatres Trust and and regional branch of the Victorian Society have objected to the proposal.