By ROSALEEN MacBRAYNE
Newmarket cobblers Peter and Jocelyn Croad have won a David and Goliath battle to save their small family business.
Their backs to the wall, the couple were determined not to lose their Shoe Sheriff shop on Broadway and took on property developers Tram Lease in the High Court last month.
In a reserved judgment, Justice Peter Salmon has ruled in their favour.
Tram Lease wanted to demolish a wall separating the shoe repair shop and a vacant KFC store on the corner of Broadway and Balm St.
That would have caused more than $130,000 of damage to the roof and structure of the premises the Croad family have occupied for 34 years.
Peter Croad took over from his late father, Alan, and secured a perpetually renewable lease in 2000 with no hint that the site was being eyed for redevelopment.
Tram Lease tried to buy out the Croads' lease this year for $80,000.
It later increased the offer and planned to resite the Shoe Sheriff within a new development on the two sites.
After being turned down, Tram Lease sought a legal declaration to allow it to pull down the joint-use wall that has sealed the 24m-long southern side of the Shoe Sheriff shop since at least 1947.
Putting up a new wall inside their boundary would have cost the Croads tens of thousands of dollars and taken up some of their already limited space.
Justice Salmon said that in a practical sense the wall was obviously a part of the shoe repair building - the roof would cave in without it.
But he found that a further hearing was necessary to look at issues such as appropriate payment for the use of the land.
Much of the freehold land along Broadway between Remuera Rd and Balm St, including the ground beneath the shoe repair shop, is owned by Tram Lease.
Jocelyn Croad said she and her husband were waiting for the final outcome but, with a young family to support, were not prepared to leave a good business.
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