A BURNSALL couple who had tried unsuccessfully to sell their village grocery shop and former post office have been given permission to convert the ground floor to a flat.

The Yorkshire Dales National Park authority considered the proposal for the change of use after hearing Richard and Judith Cheetham had been trying to sell the village grocery business for the past year.

The couple had invested their life-savings to buy the property in September 1998 and make improvements to improve turnover and achieve the standards required.

A further £20,000 was invested and a huge marketing campaign was made to promote the business through the locality. They made a policy to purchase local products and promoted home delivery.

But the patronage of local shoppers changed, with increasing numbers of holiday homes reducing the chance of more consistent sales as holiday makers tended to bring their provisions with them.

"Local competition, lower visitor numbers, poor summer weather of the last three years and costs of parking and parking restrictions in the village that made visitors move on to other areas did not help," said Mr Cheetham in a letter to the national park.

As a result, the shop was closed in November 2000.

The parish council said the main feeling in the village was one of disappointment that the shop had closed and appeared unlikely to re-open as a shop or post office.

The conditions attached to planning permission include the removal of permitted develop-ment rights and windows and walls to match the existing structure.

Permission was also given to change the use of Langcliffe Country House guest house, Kettlewell, into a dwelling.

Members were told there would be no external alterations to the eight-bedroomed guest house.

The property had been marketed through two estate agents since October 2000 but they had been unable to sell it as a going concern.

National Park member John Sayer said: "This was a private house until about 12 years ago with the business being run entirely by the family. Its change of use does not have any employment implications.

"You cannot expect people to remain in business if the business is not profitable. I think it is the only way this family can make any progress in this situation," he said, adding that he anticipated there would be more of these types of applications coming along in the future.