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The Beeches Baltic Road Kirk Michael IM6 IEF Paula Faragher Planning Enforcement Support Manager Murray House Mount Havelock Douglas IM1 2SF 26th February 2020 Re: Application to create or vary an Operator Licence - Showroom, 11 Castlemona Avenue, Douglas Ref: 20/00032/OPCEN
Dear Ms Faragher 26 FEB 2777 Please find attached to this letter an application form for change of use of the above named building and supporting documents including location and site plans, as requested.
Further to the attached, I wish to add the following background information supporting the application.
IOM Trike Tours Limited is a small local tourism business offering bespoke chauffeured and guided tours on motorised trikes around the Isle of Man. The business is supported by both Visit Isle of Man and The Department of Enterprise and often utilised during media coverage of the island. Additionally tours are sold on visiting cruise ships, and on a number of occasions, visitors to the island have only made the trip in order to complete one of our tours. The contribution that IOM Trike Tours makes to the tourism sector on the island is widely recognised.
The business currently runs from the Sea Terminal car park in Douglas, and utilises a van as a mobile office with the trikes being stored in garages at the Sea Terminal. In order to improve the service provided and better our customer experience we now wish to create a permanent base in a more professional setting and consequently require a relocation for the business. We are renting and have renovated the above address which had been previously unoccupied for a number of years and, having spoken to neighbouring residents, had become an eyesore to the area and a cause for concern. All residents that we have spoken with are delighted with the renovations and our plans to make use of the building again.
As the business is somewhat weather dependant, we consider ourselves 'seasonal' but do run all year round. Our busy season is from May to October. Our first tour leaves at 10am and last tour arrives back at approximately 5:30pm. Consequently we would expect visitors and drivers to be arriving no earlier than 9:30am and leaving no later than 5:45pm. These hours will remain the same 7 days a week in the busy season. In the quiet season we would expect up to 5 tours a week on varying days; however the latest a tour would return is around 3:30pm. Due to the nature of the business, drivers and customers will only be at the site for around 15-30 minutes either side of tour times. Our tours run at 10am, 1pm and 3:30pm.
The business has PPV licences for 4 trikes; however we only run 3 at any one time keeping one 'off the road' in case of any mechanical issues etc. We find 4 trikes sufficient for our demand and have no plans to expand on the number of trikes or type of vehicles that we use. Each trike can take up to 2 passengers and 1 driver on any one tour. For each tour time detailed above, we would have a maximum of 6 passengers and 3 drivers on site for the beginning and end of the tour.
As can be viewed on the attached site plans, the ground floor of the building is to be solely used for trike storage and customer/driver parking. Although the majority of drivers commute using motorbikes, the customer/driver parking area has enough space for around 8 car size vehicles and each trike is allocated one customer parking space per tour, providing ample off road parking for both customers and drivers so as not to impact of residents. Access into the parking area is through a large roller shutter door with double yellow lines across its front.
In addition to the information above we have also liaised with the Fire Service at the Department of Home Affairs to ensure that we comply with any relevant legislation. We have been advised that we do not require a Fire Certificate for the proposed use of the premises; however in order to comply with best practice we have completed a Fire Risk Assessment to our satisfaction, which all staff will be made aware of, and which will be made available to customers at their request.
I trust that you will find the above and attached in order; however if you have any queries or require any further clarification then please do not hesitate to contact me. In the meantime, I look forward to your reply at your earliest convenience.
Yours sincerely, KStang Katherine Stamp IOM Trike Tours Limited
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