Issues and Options Results Are In - And It Doesn't Look Good for Tesco!

St Albans Council has now published a summary of the results of its 'issues and options' consultation that took place last year. The whole summary can be found here (start at page 26 of the PDF and keep reading!). However, we've summarised the key findings that relate to London Road here, with especially interesting findings in red! Many thanks to all of you who contributed your thoughts!

SUMMARY OF THE ISSUES AND OPTIONS CONSULTATION STAGE FOR THE CORE STRATEGY DEVELOPMENT PLAN DOCUMENT AND NEXT STEPS

EXEC SUMMARY
xix) The consultation has generated considerable opposition to another food store in the District, in any of the three possible locations. A number of respondents have questioned whether there is proven need for additional convenience goods floorspace.

Option 29a – Improving and enhancing the range of shops, facilities and services?

Officers note that a Tesco store in London Road is not generally supported (see also Q55 regarding other possible uses for this site).

Q32: Given the lack of opportunities for additional convenience (i.e. food store) floorspace on City Centre or Edge of Centre sites in St Albans, do you think that any proven quantitative need should be met on an out of centre site?

Those supporting: 10
Those objecting: 58
Summary Response included:
- Strong objection to a new Tesco store in Alma Road/London Road.
- A significant number of respondents considered that there was no proven need for further food store development in St Albans, despite the findings of the Council’s Retail and Leisure Study (2006).

Officers’ Comments and Recommended Action:
The Council accepted the consultants’ findings (GL Hearn Report) in terms of the quantitative and qualitative need for additional food store floorspace within St Albans. However, Officers consider that it would be appropriate to revisit some of the assumptions made for calculating retail need, in the light of information that is now available and to take into account any changing circumstances since the work was originally carried out. In particular, Officers consider that it would now be more appropriate for assumed population growth within the District to be based on the housing growth figures for St Albans City and District as set out in the draft RSS14, rather than on the growth estimates from the 2001 Census.
The re-assessment work will need to take place prior to the Preferred Options stage of Core Strategy preparation, as it could potentially have a bearing on the consultants’ overall findings, in terms of quantitative need for convenience floorspace.
Respondents have raised various concerns regarding the potential location of a new food store, which will need to be taken into account if the updated retail study still identifies any need for a new store that cannot be accommodated on a City Centre site (see Officers’ response to Q35 and Q36).

Q33: If the Core Strategy was to propose an out of centre location to accommodate a new food store, would you support the Evershed Site
Those supporting: 6
Those objecting: 42
Observations: 1

Summary Responses were:

Strong opposition on the following grounds:

• Increased traffic congestion and pollution
• Damage to local businesses in City Centre
• Loss of locally listed buildings
• Wasted opportunity for residential or mixed use development (including a primary school or leisure/arts facilities)
• Already sufficient supermarkets
• Fails to meet qualitative deficiency for a City Centre store.
• No linked trips – people unlikely to walk from the site up London Road into the City Centre and back.
• Scale of development would be excessive in the context of the surrounding townscape
A foodstore on this site would prevent the development of a store on the sequentially preferable Civic Centre South site.
HCC Passenger Transport Unit considers that the site is poorly served by local town bus services.

Tesco considers that the site has the closest relationship to the City Centre shopping area and is located on an established commercial thoroughfare, directly linked to it. The company considers that the development would encourage linked trips and support retailing in the City Centre. Site is accessible by public transport and is a brownfield site.

Officers’ Comments and Recommended Action:
See Officers’ response to Q32 (regarding quantitative need for a new food store). Whilst no conclusions can be drawn pending the outcome of the Council’s updating work on convenience retail need, Officers note the strong opposition from residents to Option FS1 (and also the comments made by Tesco Stores Ltd). It is understood that Tesco intend to carry out a further public consultation exercise with regard to the possibility of a food store on this site in November 2007, with a view to submitting a planning application by the end of the year. See also respondents’ comments to Q55 (r.e. other proposed uses for this land)

For other the other proposed supermarket sites: Option 33b – FS2 North of St Albans City Centre Those supporting: 14 Those objecting: 22
Option 33c – FS3 North of St Albans Those supporting: 9 Those objecting: 30