Council chiefs have torn up controversial plans to demolish Perth City Hall.
Perth and Kinross Council confirmed it has formally withdrawn its listed building application to tear down the iconic Edwardian building.
The surprise announcement comes just weeks after councillors backed a plan to convert the hall into a food market.
But a council spokeswoman last night stressed that the planning application had been scrapped for technical reasons, rather than anything more significant. She said: “We have withdrawn the application as the supporting evidence included within the application is no longer valid.
“On October 7, members of the council agreed to appoint Perth Market Place Ltd as the preferred bidder for the lease of the former city hall buildings.
“Discussions with the organisation are ongoing and a report on whether a number of pre-conditions have been met along with the proposed terms of the ground lease will come back to the February 2016 meeting of the council.”
She added: “If the pre-conditions are not met, it will be a matter for council to consider the next steps.”
Perth Market Place Ltd has been given until the new year to prove its project is financially sound. The market plan was backed by councillors ahead of a separate proposal to turn the building into a hotel.
Perth Market Place said that the period of three months set at the meeting for the bid to satisfy various preconditions in order to achieve a lease could only start once his group had received formal notification of these conditions and a closing date for the submission of requested paperwork.
The hall closed its doors 10 years ago and has lain empty since. Earlier this summer, more than 1,200 people signed a petition calling for the building to be made public as part of Doors Open Day.
However, the council rejected the appeal claiming that the building was “unsuitable” for viewing.
Local authority officers lodged their plan to demolish city hall in February, last year. In their planning statement, agents for the council stated: “Over the process of the last 10 years, no viable proposals have come forward that can be considered to demonstrate the realistic prospect of re-use or redevelopment.”
The plan attracted more than 1,000 letters and e-mails from opponents calling for the scheme to be scrapped.
The council has written to all objectors about its decision to withdraw the plan. They are told their objection will not be transferred to “any subsequent application resubmitted at a later date.”