Ealing Cinema.... Is it A Date?

Council Leader Julian Bell says he believes work may be starting on 12 December

Ealing's Council Leader says he's confident work will start on the cinema next month - despite fears that there could be yet more delays.

In August the site was sold by Land Securites to St George PLC, the developers of the Dickens Yard development.

Because the development has been beset with a multitude of problems Liberal Democrats launched a petition calling on the new developers to 'make the construction of the already planned Filmworks scheme a priority, announce a completion date, and provide reassurances that there is still interest from Picturehouse Cinemas to run the venue.''

In October St George promised work would start in December, but Ealing Common Councillor Jon Ball remains concerned. He said:

'' "St George have recently indicated that they will be making changes to the scheme within the existing permission. I'm concerned that this presents further risk of delay to the completion of the cinema."

"I hope that meaningful work on the cinema site will start in December, but that is merely the next step in this saga. What the people of Ealing want is to have a cinema open again. St George have a terrible record at the Dickens Yard site across the road of concentrating on the luxury flats and putting off everything else until the end of the scheme, in that case leaving dozens of shop units empty.

''St George must give a clear opening date for the new cinema in order to prove that they're not going to pull exactly the same trick on this side of the road and leave the cinema closed until all the flats are sold."

Ealing Council Leader, Julian Bell has given the first actual indication of a start date:

'' St George doing it is going to help to deliver it sooner because they’re already on site – Dickens Yard behind the Town Hall – so the cinema becomes Dickens Yard Phase Two. They’ve already started doing things on site, levelling the ground etc. The original facade will stay. I went to see Tony Pidgley, Chair of Berkley Group - the parent group of St George - and I said to him that the original proposal by Land Securities was to start on site in December in 2016, I want you to do the same.

''So, we’ll be breaking ground in December as planned – I think the 12th. St George have not given a date yet, but I have said I want it to be finished late 2018 early 2019. And again that was the original finish date when Land Securities were the party involved.''

We have asked for confirmation from St George that this is the date work will start on the cinema. Will update once this is received.

9th November 2016