Chesterfield bar ‘saddened’ after efforts to improve town centre as council orders them to remove decorations

Staff from Albert’s and Apartment had decorated a corner of Rykneld Square in the town centre, hanging lights from lampposts and adding planters.

In a Facebook post, Albert’s said: “Alongside our good friends at Apartment Bar, we decided to give part of Rykneld Square a little titivate with some festoon lighting and planters. We think it looks pretty smashing now.”

Last week, however, they were ordered to take down the decorations by Derbyshire County Council – who said they would have to pay for the removal if they did not meet a seven-day deadline.

The post continued: “Today, we arrived at site to a letter from Derbyshire County Council demanding that the lighting is removed within seven days, or face charges for the removal of them by council workers, with no suggestion as to how we could work together to maintain the lighting.

This, according to their Facebook past, saddened the Albert’s team, who said they had collaborated with Apartment to enhance the town centre.

“This made us sad, especially since we worked with another local business in order to try to improve the look of our town centre as we become increasingly surrounded by boarded-up shops.”

A spokesperson for Derbyshire County Council said that they asked for the removal of the decorations on the grounds of safety.

“We recognise that the bar owners thought that they were making their area more attractive, but we cannot allow fairy lights to be attached to our lampposts. This is because if there was to be a fault on these lights then the street light pole could become live, and could seriously injure someone.

“We have asked the bar to take the lights down and would be grateful if they could do this as soon as possible.”

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