Coffee chain Starbucks has lodged a planning application for an outlet in Cork city which opened its doors nearly 18 months ago.

Starbucks opened the outlet at Prince’s Street in March of last year, along with two others at Emmet Place and St Patrick’s Street.

In March of this year, An Bord Pleanála ruled that Starbucks opened the three cafes without planning permission.

The planning authority said the coffee chain’s branches on St Patrick’s Street, Prince’s Street and Emmet Place were all opened in commercial units that were formerly retail shops.

An Bord Pleanála ruled that the cafes represented a change of use of these units and planning permission was required.

Starbucks subsequently removed the seating at its Prince’s Street and St Patrick’s Street cafes so the stores operated as takeaway locations, so that the company would not have to apply for planning permission.

A planning application was lodged for the Emmet Place store in April in order to retain the use of the unit as a coffee shop with seating.

Starbucks has now lodged a similar planning application for the Prince’s Street store.

The application was filed under the name Tailes Ltd and seeks to retain permission for the store’s use as a coffee shop with seating.

In the application, the company said retailers such as Starbucks “are considered to be an essential component of a vibrant retail centre”.

Controversy

The planning application comes after a year of controversy surrounding the Starbucks outlets in Cork city centre.

A numbers of complaints had been made to planners about the cafes.

The cafes in Patrick Street and Princes Street were served with official enforcement notices, which put the onus on the company to rectify planning issues.

The Starbucks head office in the UK was contacted about the latest planning application in Cork, but it did not respond.

Starbucks is the largest coffee shop business in the world, with some 21,500 stores in 65 countries and territories.