A new eatery could be coming to the town centre to replace a closed down Vietnamese cafe.

New company L Rusta is seeking a license to sell alcohol ahead of plans to open a café/restaurant at 20 Market Place, next to the former post office and tailoring shop La Sartoria.

Reading Borough Council (RBC) will decide whether to approve the application at next week’s (Tuesday, January 14) Licensing Applications committee meeting.

The licence would allow a future café or restaurant to sell alcohol from 11am to 11pm.

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The unit was most recently MumMum, a Vietnamese takeaway and café/restaurant which opened in September 2018 and closed in June 2019.

Before that, the shop unit hosted Happy Pretzel.

Reading Borough Council (RBC) and Thames Valley Police (TVP) have agreed 16 conditions with L Rusta which they say will promote the four licensing objectives.

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The application has, however, received opposition from one member of the public.

Katherine Brown has sent a representation to the council calling for the licensed hours applied for to be reduced to avoid a negative impact on children in the flats above.

She said: “The premise is below a residential flat block with residents that include children.

“L Rusta LTD have indicated several ways the intend to avoid causing problems in the area and this is appreciated.

“However, it is believed that the length of the proposed licence could present a noise nuisance for residents of the flat block that could also negatively impact child residents of the flats.”

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Dr Brown has called for three possible reductions in their licensable hours, in order of preference:

  • Licensable hours till 9pm
  • Licensable hours till 10pm
  • Licensable hours limited for part of the week (i.e. Sunday to Thursday)

There is currently no licence in force at the premises. The unit was previously licensed as a shop with an off licence, which was surrendered in August 2010.

Opening hours would be from 7am to 11pm, with alcohol only on sale from 11am till closure.