The Farsight Collective team: Duncan Dick, Euan Johnstone and Sean McClusky

OPERATORS of a new Tin Pan Alley music venue have shown it is possible to convince councillors to take a relaxed view of a council’s saturation policies after securing a late-night licence.

The Farsight Collective in Denmark Street was granted permission at a Town Hall meeting last week to stay open until 4am at weekends and 2.30am during the week.

Its owners said its arrival in a road famous for its musical heritage could help revive the West End’s live music scene.

Councillors stipulated that alcohol sales have to cease an hour before closing, to help manage how crowds leave.

Camden normally applies a “cumulative impact” policy to stop too many venues clustering near people’s homes, but is moving to a less rigid approach as part of an ambition to protect its reputation for live performance.

The street has seen redevelopment all around it but was known for decades as the best place in London to go guitar shopping or to see a gig.

One of the rooms in the building was the studio where the Rolling Stones cut their first album.

In its promotional material, The Farsight Collective warned too many loved venues had been lost, including the Astoria which was bulldozed to make way for the new Tottenham Court Road station and Crossrail, and The End nightclub. Madame Jojo’s Bar Rhumba, The Borderline and the 12 Bar have all been lost from central London’s live music landscape.

The new venue’s owners filed one of the most detailed applications ever seen by the licensing committee, and their approach to neighbours has been welcomed by community groups. They have designed what they call a “departure lounge”, an area where customers will book cabs and have a drink of water or coffee before they leave.

The plan to keep people waiting for taxis inside aims to cut crime, disturbances, and allow people to decompress after being surrounded by the venue’s sound system.

With these policies in place, they earned the backing of the Bloomsbury Association, which said they had “carried out genuine engagement and responded to concerns by enhancing their plans”.

Director Duncan Dick told the Extra: “We’re delighted.

“It felt like a recognition of the work we put in con­sulting. We’re well aware that the licence – and opening a new grassroots music venue – is a great privilege and a huge responsibility.

“We will be working our backsides off to make sure we don’t let anyone down.”

As well as 152 letters of support, the council received 20 objections.

The Covent Garden Community Association’s licensing committee chairman David Kaner told the Extra the application had been “exemplary”, but it highlighted the need for the council to keep their cumulative impact zone policies.

Mr Kaner said: “The CGCA had a number of discussions with Farsight about the likely issues.

“This shows the benefit of cumulative impact and framework hours policies. The council still seems to be determined to remove these protections.

“This will make it much easier to get licences into the early morning without having to put in place anything to address issues and will destroy the balance between businesses and residents.

“Farsight did an exemplary job. They made a number of proposals that will mitigate some issues; but there will still be some negative impact.”