PRIVATE hire car company owner Azam Choudhry is celebrating after winning his appeal to keep his business open overnight.
Mr Choudhry, who owns City Cars in Eastgate Street, submitted a change of use application for the site to Gloucester City Council last year.
The firm is run from a former hairdressing shop with parking at Julian Rogers Autoservices in King's Barton Street.
At a planning meeting in September, Mr Choudhry was granted permission to stay at the location despite opposition from some King's Barton Street residents and rival company Andy Cars.
Opponents argued that the residents who lived near the premises would suffer because of the amount of traffic using the road and that taxi's parked outside would limit access for residents.
City Cars, which has one full-time and two part-time drivers, has a contract to park their cars there when they are not in use.
In order to abate these concerns, the city council's planning committee put a number of conditions on the application which included forcing Mr Choudhry to keep his business closed during the hours of midnight and 9am – arguably the busiest time for private hire companies.
Mr Choudhry appealed the decision and an inspector has now said the time constraints on the business is "neither reasonable nor necessary" and has deleted the condition.
"I'm very happy with the decision," said Mr Choudhry.
"The last few months have been a very worrying time for me as I was concerned about all the trade I was missing out on while other companies were allowed to work during the night.
"Now that all of this is sorted out I can start planning for the future and finding ways to expand and improve the company."
Andy Cars owner Neil Mackie, who spoke against the planning application at a hearing in September, said: "I am just disappointed for the residents of King's Barton Street.
"It's just not a viable application and I just feel sorry for the residents who are going to suffer as a result of this appeal being allowed.
"The problem in Gloucester is that planning is not helping businesses in any shape or form."
A spokesman from Gloucester City Council said: "The planning committee was concerned about the impact of extra noise and traffic affecting residents in the King's Barton Street area and for these reasons planning permission was granted with restrictions to opening hours.
"An independent inspector who heard the appeal has concluded that the extension of business opening hours would not have a significant impact on local residents."
