RESIDENTS have won a four-year battle to see a derelict pub transformed into a mini-supermarket.

Tesco was this week given permission to open a store on the site of the Fox and Hounds pub.

More than 300 people signed a petition calling for the plans for the Abingdon Road pub, which was gutted by a fire in 2009, to go ahead.

William Rankin, who lives in Chatham Road and organised the petition, said: “The general feeling of people I’ve spoken to is that the area needed this store.

“At the moment we only have one shop which doesn’t stock everything that’s needed.

“The building has deteriorated since the pub closed and we have had to put up with it since 2007.”

Tesco bought the pub in 2008 and had to put in five planning applications before eventually getting approval from the city council’s west area planning committee. Their proposals were even taken to a government planning inspector who threw them out on appeal.

City councillors have now told the firm it can demolish the pub and build a Tesco Express store with four flats above it.

Tesco’s regional corporate affairs manager Simon Petar said: “We are delighted to have been given permission to go ahead with this store.

“We are looking forward to bringing additional choice and value to the local community.”

Mr Petar could not confirm when work would begin.

The new store is expected to bring up to 30 jobs to the area.

Some residents had expressed concern about the impact of a new store on local businesses but committee member John Tanner said they could not consider this.

He said: “I know it’s very hard on existing retailers but it is not our job as planners to say which shops should survive or not.

“It’s a much better scheme than was previously put forward.”

The application was approved despite concerns about increased traffic turning right and people crossing the road to the shop.

A statement from Oxfordshire County Council’s road safety team said there were “adequate pedestrian facilities”and more traffic turning right was “unlikely to have a significant impact”.

Tesco also has approval to open a new Express store in Oxford Road, Abingdon on the site of former Greene King pub The Ox which closed down in March.