Keen to develop former hotel

The owners of a former pub want a developer to turn it into a restaurant, flats, and shops.

The Ram Hotel, on Castlegate, Newark, which is listed for protection, is owned by the London-based Bosscat and Freston pension funds.

The pub, which in recent years has been called Ye Olde Market, closed in July last year because the then new owners, the Swallow Hotel Group, felt it did not meet their standards.

The company went into administration, and the latest owners have been given permission by Newark and Sherwood District Council to pursue the new plans after deciding it was not viable to re-open the building as a hotel.

The proposals include refurbishing the ground floor facing Castlegate to make it into a bar and restaurant.

The wing of the ground floor facing Boar Lane would become five shops.

The upper floors would be converted into seven apartments.

Garages at the back would be demolished and replaced with two two-bedroom houses.

No parking spaces would be provided.

Camelot Property, which places tenants in empty buildings to prevent vandalism and theft, has been guarding the building since December.

Mr Simon Tilsiter, the managing agent for the owners, hoped that the new shops would encourage shoppers to use Boar Lane more as a thoroughfare into the town centre.

He said: “We want to find a joint-venture partner. My clients are not builders or developers, so we are looking for a local company to come on board.

“We are trying to do the best thing for the property, but these things take time. The permissions might have to be tweaked if the developer has their own ideas.”

Mr Tilsiter said it would be several months before work began, and the current Camelot tenants would remain until then.

The chairman of Newark Business Club, Mr Dean Hyde, said: “I am thrilled because Castlegate is a fantastic advert for Newark.

“We have some great restaurants along there, and realistically, a restaurant is the right use because there would have been serious problems with carparking if it had been made into a hotel.

“The new shops will create a natural walkway from Castlegate into Middlegate, and this will be better than the boarded up property we have at the moment.”

The current building is believed to be late 18th Century. The existence of The Ram can be traced as far back as 1556, although it is not clear if it was on the same site.

The earliest reference to the building on Castlegate was 1775.

The novelist George Eliot stayed at The Ram in 1868.

In 1939 it was bought by Home Brewery, which owned it for about 60 years.