PLANS have been drawn up to expand agricultural operations near a former landmark pub on the Burnley and Rossendale border.

The Deerplay, on the Burnley to Bacup road at Weir, parts of which date back to the 18th century, has been empty for more than three years.

Now Andrew Cockcroft, who owns the building, has approached Burnley Council with a bid to create a hay meadow on a four-acre plot nearby.

This would involve the construction of an agricultural building on the moors, to the rear of the old pub, where farm equipment could be stored.

Planning agent Steven Hartley said: “The applicant wishes to maintain the land and to take a hay crop from it.

“At such an altitude the climate is challenging and there is a need for an agricultural building to store a tractor and bailer, other agricultural machinery and for hay.

“Machinery left outside will not only suffer from the weather but will also be susceptible to theft – as has been the case with regard to the former public house.”

Mr Cockcroft, who lives nearby at Windy Bank Coach House, in Burnley Road East, Clough Bottom, was behind a planning permission, in 2015, to convert the vacant pub site into four houses.

Mr Hartley added: “The proposed building will allow the land to be managed, protecting it from further encroachment by the moor.”

He has also told planners that the proposed new storage building would not interfere with the skyline.

The pub, which changed hands on a number of occasions before it ceased trading, is not nationally listed but does feature in borough archives as a locally significant site architecturally.

Land in the immediate vicinity of the pub is used for sheep grazing and there are a number of larger agricultural holdings closer to Weir village.

The field earmarked as a hay meadow is designated as rough pasture.

Cllr Gordon Birtwistle, the former Burnley MP who represents Coalclough with Deerplay ward on the borough council, said: “This would be an excellent use of the land and I’d have no problem with it. It’s not been used as a pub for some time.”

Historical records show that the pub, constructed on the route of the original Burnley to Bacup turnpike road as two houses, was first used as licensed premises in the late 19th century.