It's official - Tenbury and it's Teme Bridge are "Unsuitable for HGV's" - it says so on numerous road signs approaching the bridge on the A456 - so it must be unsuitable [right]? Apparently it's not quite as straightforward as that.. After a lengthy traffic study [these commonly last up to 9 months], Tenbury's Teme Bridge would have been considered "Unsuitable for HGV's" when the Council finally gave legal backing to a Traffic Regulation Order (TRO) formalising this. Although this is an advisory sign only the Council did clearly agree that it was required across the Teme Bridge which is one of only a couple of important Scheduled Ancient Monuments in the area.A quick internet search reveals tens of stories about hauliers allowing their sat navs to dictate their journey in country areas - only to get trapped under low bridges or down narrow lanes. Tenbury too suffers from HGV drivers relying on sat nav technology - the result being large articulated lorries picking their way awkwardly through town creating traffic jams and frustration. So against this background one has to wonder at the logic of potentially agreeing to yet another swathe of HGV's related to a potential Tesco development into Tenbury coming over our protected ancient bridge.
In Tesco's recent charm offensive with Malvern Hills District Council and [impendingly] local people again, the figure of "9 lorries.. per week" [plus assorted others] has been put about as fact. The likelihood is though that this will be a starting figure only [if really adhered to at all]. Much in the same way, a certain level of HGV deliveries were promised to the local people before the Ludlow Tesco was built in order to help get them 'on side' too with that development. The reality at Ludlow however is that [according to a source at Ludlow Tesco] deliveries actually "arrive at all times". So Tesco have apparently already flouted promises made both about frequency of deliveries and constraining deliveries outside to of school pick up times etc too.
It's also worth noting Conservative County Councillor Ken Pollock in his 'Feb 09 - Tenbury Matters' leaflet, commented on the demise of the ill-fated Tenbury Biomass plant plans: “Stopping more big lorries running through the town was one of the main reasons for opposition to the biomass plant in the Business Park”. He accompanies his article with an image of an articulated HGV squeezing in between Tenbury's Market Tavern and Caldicott's yard titled 'A lorry from Penrith dominates in Market Street'. So there is a clear precedent for the voice of concerned locals to hold sway in decision-making and planning issues in relation to HGV traffic. Logic would suggest then that this heightened level of concern regarding increasing HGV traffic will overcome then in a similar way with Tesco's plans as they did the Biomass plant? The answer to that is that I guess we'll have to wait and see when Tesco present their revised plans for the Cattle Market site.
So the question arises - is the multi month consultation period and resultant Traffic Regulation Order to deter HGV Traffic over Tenbury's Teme Bridge really worth the sign it's printed on? If Tesco get their way with local developments it would make a further mockery of the order with substantially increased HGV traffic - rendering it totally irrelevant and impotent. If that's the case then maybe the monies and time spent on bridge assessment could have been better used on something locally that clearly -is- taken seriously by local councils?
