News / Harbourside
The Cuban could face closure
Councillors will decide this week whether a popular restaurant in Bristol’s Harbourside has to close.
Police believe the owners of The Cuban on Millennium Promenade have been pushing beyond the remit of their licence: opening late, allowing glass outside and creating noise complaints.
They also say it has not had enough door staff on and a register for bouncers may have been forged to fool officers.
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But many punters say The Cuban is a safe and fun place to visit and do not want to see it close.
Bristol City Council’s licensing committee will decide on Wednesday whether the restaurant has been operating as a bar to pull in more customers – and if so, whether it should have its licence revoked.
It comes after complaints from neighbours, one of which said the noise was “immense” and claimed that for more than two years The Cuban had “caused us quite a lot of distress”.
At a previous council meeting, lawyer Piers Warne said The Cuban had reined in the late nights and outside drinking to placate neighbours.
But since then the restaurant has been struggling financially and the owner has had to plough £5,000 a week into the restaurant to keep it afloat, the lawyer said.
At the last meeting, police licensing officer Martin Rowland said: “We’ve seen many licence breaches. They all seemed to point toward it wanting to operate more as a bar than a restaurant.”
A 40-year-old resident of Anchor Point on Cathedral Walk only a few hundred yards away from The Cuban said that she and some of her neighbours have regularly been “plagued” by noise from the restaurant.
She told Bristol24/7: “I was recently working on my laptop at 11.30pm on a weeknight and music from The Cuban was blaring out and didn’t stop until after midnight. I could barely stand being in my own living room.”
There are also people, however, who would miss The Cuban if it was forced to shut.
Rebecca Pearson, lecturer in psychiatric epidemiology at the University of Bristol, said: “I have never seen any trouble there at all and myself and international guests have stayed in the Ibis close by and Airbnb flats right next door with no complaints.”
Jack Pitts is a local democracy reporter for Bristol.
Read more: Rents in Bristol rocket
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