Tesco Plans - 436 Objections and Rising by the Day

If you look today on the Malvern Hills Planning Website under the new Tesco Cattle Market application [10/01276/FUL] then you'll see that there's a long list of personal objections to Tesco's revised plans. What's more, the list grows by the day as Malvern Hills' staff deal with the backlog of objections sent in.

Presently there's about 170 personal planning-related objections listed with about 6 refs only that aren't wholly objections [such as concerns from the local crime risk manager of the possibility of the site attracting anti-social/inappropriate activity if accepted].

The image at the top of this piece reflects another 266+ individual signed and addressed objections that were put in to Malvern Hills District Council on monday 8th November on top of the 170 or so already lodged. These were from a range of local people and people from the locale who use Tenbury for regular shopping activities.

The sums: 266 + 170 = 436 objections and rising..

Even as we took these objection letters in - more were arriving from local people and businesses. From this evidence and the fact that many who have submitted objections already haven't yet seen their own letters lodged online, we conclude that there are many more letters in the system at Malvern on top of those 436 already mentioned. Who knows - there may even be an eventual figure greater than the 500 objections lodged against Tesco's initial plans.

Tenbury Town Council
Tenbury Town Council's acceptance of the revised plans is there too. We understand that the Town Council voted 7:1 for the revised plans albeit with 4 Councilors abstaining from the vote. We feel though that this decision isn't representative of the groundswell of opinion locally, we suspect too that it's ill informed and that it's very much a decision that could impact negatively on the very town they seek to enhance. With their acceptance however is a clear set of concerns and caveats - one of which regarding the status of the Teme Bridge . This is one thing we as a group would support further investigation in and have been very concerned about for some time now [see previous blog entries].

Be careful what you wish for
Common themes in the objection letters ranged from concerns over additional traffic congestion and additional large HGV deliveries, the precarious structural nature of the Teme bridge, parking and the fact that a Tesco would do little to address the town's limited amount of spaces and the negative impact a Tesco would have on local businesses in the high street. You only have to look at the previous article on this blog to see just why people are so concerned with the last point - Llandrindod Wells' Tesco has caused a 25% loss in highstreet trade in the town in just a few short months since it's opening in July 2010. Local traders in the town are so concerned that they held crisis talks to try and come up with a solution. In reality there was little they could do though, the time to object had passed. Tesco the wolf was now very much inside grandma's house and the traders had just invited them in thinking there would be little or no changes.

Nearly 450 local people speak with one voice
So with 436 objections and rising... The message to both Tesco and Malvern Hills' planners is very clear in respect of Tenbury: there are a substantial amount of local people still very much against Tesco's plans here. We don't want the Llandrindod scenario here thanks!