A bid to give pizza diners a slice of York's busy Parliament Street has been put on hold so councillors can see the site first hand.

Pizza Hut has applied to City of York Council to create a 18-seat open air eating area in front of its restaurant.

The plan has drawn criticism from city centre residents, who are concerned that it would add to congestion in an already busy area, and members of the York Blind and Partially Sighted Society, who feel the pavement caf would create a further obstacle for blind people to negotiate.

When members of the council's city centre area planning sub-committee met to consider the bid last night, they decided to defer the application until they could visit the site to see how the proposed 4m by 7m space eating area would fit in.

The plan proposes to put the area 2.6m away from the shop front to leave a clear passage for pedestrians.

But committee member Coun Gerald Dean said he was concerned about waiting staff and customers cutting across the flow of pedestrians as they moved between the restaurant and the table area.

Committee chairman Coun Martin Brumby said he appreciated the concerns but pointed to the example of pavement cafs in Europe where waiting staff "zoom in and out without causing any problems".

Meanwhile, a bid to create 24 new flats by converting shops and offices and building a new block in Micklegate got the go-ahead from the committee.

Yorkshire Housing has won approval to convert shops and offices at 63, 65 and 67 Micklegate into five flats, demolish outbuildings at the back, and build a block of 19 flats fronting onto Trinity Lane.

All the flats will be for rent with a percentage at "affordable" level rents.

Updated: 08:42 Friday, August 10, 2001