Councillors have been asked to give backdated approval to four new air conditioning units at a heritage café owned by their own authority.

Burnley Council's development control committee has been recommended to grant retrospective planning permission to the additions to the The Old Stables Restaurant in Towneley Park.

The Grade II heritage-listed building is part of the Towneley Hall estate owned by the borough.

A planning officer's report to Thursday's meeting of the committee says: "This application relates to the former stables and coach house to Towneley Hall, dating from 1790 and converted into a café in the early 1950s.

"The building is a heritage asset of high significance, reflected in its Grade II listing.

"The nature of this significance is derived primarily from its historic and evidential interest resulting from its ancillary relationship to Towneley Hall and its integral part of the designed parkland.

"The application site is located within the grounds, and therefore the setting, of Townley Hall (Listed Grade I) and forms part of an assemblage of other surviving ancillary and service buildings on the estate, which are also features of interest within Towneley Park, a Grade II Registered Park and Garden.

"This application seeks retrospective planning permission to regularise the installation of four external condensing air conditioning units undertaken as part of the café refurbishment works in October 2023.

"The units are two different sizes - the largest measuring 950mm wide by 943mm high by 330mm deep; and the smaller 809mm wide by 630mm high by 300mm deep.

"The location was agreed in consultation with the council’s heritage planner.

"The units provide both heating and cooling capability as required.

"The units are discreetly located on the boundary wall to the rear yard of the listed building, away from the publicly visible parts of the building and in an area which makes no meaningful contribution to its special interest and is therefore less sensitive to alterations.

"It is therefore considered that the proposal preserves the special interest of the listed building in its entirety."