Eimear FlanaganBBC News NI
BBC
The former Antrim Arms hotel in Ballycastle town centre has been a listed building since 1981
The owner of a dangerous listed building has said he still does not know what will happen to it nearly a year after the council declared the structure unsafe.
Declan Wright owns the former Antrim Arms Hotel in Ballycastle, which has been cordoned off since masonry started falling off it last October.
He was taken to court twice by Causeway Coast and Glens Council, which last month refused his application to demolish the historic property.
But Mr Wright insists his company cannot afford the “unviable” cost of repairing it, telling BBC News NI: “I’m in a state of paralysis – I can’t do anything.”
He also claimed council officials do not seem to know what to do next either.
The council, which recently installed shipping containers outside the building to protect pedestrians, said it was “currently unable to confirm when the matter will next be before the court”.
The building, at the corner of Castle Street and Fairhill Street, was first cordoned off last October
As managing director of Maplemanor Properties, Mr Wright has owned the Antrim Arms for about 25 years.
On 7 October he received a dangerous structure notice from the council and said within three days he had organised a demolition contractor “to get rid of the danger of it falling onto the public”.
However, parts of the building date back almost 400 years and the property has been listed since 1981, so unauthorised demolition could be a criminal offence.
“By doing anything I would potentially be leaving myself exposed to prosecution for touching a listed building, and by doing nothing I was in court with the council building control department,” Mr Wright explained.
At a hearing in January, a judge acknowledged the site was dangerous but also said the owner was “stuck between a rock and a hard place”.
Mr Wright claimed the council then advised he could apply for “listed building consent” to knock the structure down, which he submitted in May.
But on 6 August the council refused his application, following advice from the Department for Communities’ Historic Environment Division (HED).
The council’s decision notice said the owner failed to demonstrate why the building “could not be retained in its original or a reasonably modified form”.
Ballycastle’s historic ‘showstopper’
Courtesy of National Museums NI
Parts of the listed Georgian-era building are believed to date back to the 1760s
Among the 87 objectors who submitted letters opposing demolition was Ulster Architectural Heritage (UAE).
“You would be demolishing a building from the 1700s – a building that is central to Ballycastle and its history,” said Sebastian Graham, UAE’s heritage at risk officer.
He described the Antrim Arms as a “very important building” within a conservation zone and “the showstopper” of Ballycastle’s Diamond area.
But Mr Graham is disappointed by its current state, saying it lay vacant “for a very long time with no suggestion of any planning put forward for its reuse”.
“The vegetation has grown on it in the meantime, every year you see it.”
Why did a protected structure fall into a dangerous state?
Last month shipping containers were positioned outside the hotel to protect pedestrians during Ballycastle’s annual showpiece event, the Ould Lammas Fair
Having bought the building in the late 1990s, Mr Wright operated it as a hotel for a few years, but said its small, bathroomless rooms failed to attract customers.
He then leased it to other hotel operators but they faced the same problems and “couldn’t make it work”.
He estimated the Antrim Arms has been vacant for about 10 years, but insists he tried to take care of it.
“The building has been kept dry, the windows that get broken every so often have been fixed.
“I’ve done all the bits that I could, but there’s a limit to what you can do.”
Mr Wright denies he is among developers who allow buildings to fall to ruin to clear the way for redevelopment.
“I don’t want to come across as being a greedy developer because that’s not the case,” he insisted.
“You don’t buy anything ever with an intention of it falling down, but ultimately the gable wall has bowed.”
He explained the Antrim Arms is so old it has no proper foundations and believes it was destabilised by utility firms repeatedly digging up the pavement outside.
Why not repair the building?
A demolition contractor advised Mr Wright it could cost more than £1m just to dismantle and rebuild the unstable gable wall.
Pieces of wall would be loaded into a crane basket by hand, blocking off Fairhill Street for almost a year.
“If the decision is that [authorities] want to maintain it regardless of cost, well then you can’t expect the developer to fund all of that,” Mr Wright said.
Councils have powers to take “at risk” listed buildings into public ownership, but Mr Wright argues this project would still be unviable.
“Is it good value for the ratepayers to spend a million pounds to take down a wall and rebuild it, to still leave a building that’s not useable?… I don’t think so.”
Could the Antrim Arms be replicated?
The owner claims the building “has been changed many, many times” and he wants to replace it will a new hotel that would look the same from the outside
Despite his difficulties, Mr Wright does not want to sell up, saying: “I want to build a modern, boutique hotel on the site.”
He claims a new, accessible hotel could look exactly the same on the outside as the existing building.
“It’s a rendered finish that can be absolutely recreated identically, with modern building methods.”
But UAE’s Sebastian Graham warned if such an approach was accepted it could wipe out centuries of architectural history.
“If you were going to use that example of ‘it’s just a rendered building, it needs to be demolished’ you would probably lose a significant amount of listed buildings.”
Mr Graham acknowledged renovation would be “very costly” but argued it was not impossible for the right developer.
“If he can’t do it, I’m sure somebody else will take up the mantle and make a go of it.”
As regards the next step, Mr Wright said the council told him he could appeal, but he is unsure if he will because HED’s stance has not changed.
In a statement, HED said it has engaged with the owner and the council to “encourage appropriate measures that will safeguard the building and ensure necessary repairs are undertaken in line with its listed status”.
“HED continues to seek the conservation and appropriate retention and repair of the building, in keeping with its listed status and heritage value.”
