Plan for new Food Superstore are revealed
AN application for a Food Superstore, which would be the biggest ever built in Lisburn, has been lodged with the Planning Service for land off the Lisburn North Feeder Road.
The application is for an 8,000sq metre outlet - over 86,000 square feet - at the junction of the new road and the Magheralave Road. The current application for an extension to the Tesco store in Bentrim Road would take it to 72,000 square feet.
The application, submitted by Wildrose (Magheralave) Ltd., is for outline planning permission and has been designated as an Article 31 major application by the planning service. It means planners will now seek views on whether it should be subject to a Public Inquiry. They have not given a view on whether it should be approved or not.
But councillors raised concerns over the application at the Planning Committee meeting on Monday evening, and local residents have reacted to the news with unease saying should plans for the superstore go ahead, their whole way of life would be "disrupted."
Lisburn North Councillors Paul Givan and Jonathan Craig received support to send a letter to the Planning Service and the Department of Environment expressing the council's concern over the application.
Mr Givan said: "This application represents a major departure from the local area plan which has identified this land as permitted development for residential housing. To place a supersized food store here would be to repeat the mistake of allowing Tesco to be built beside the residents in Benson Street.
"I have also serious concerns about the impact this would have on the existing commercial vitality on Lisburn City Centre. There is an unhealthy desire by supermarkets to locate themselves away from town centres and create their own retail islands to ensure maximum spend in their store as opposed to integrating their retail offer with established shopping centres and helping to generate the footfall that will benefit everyone."
Mr Givan continued: "This proposal cannot even be considered as an 'edge of town' location for a supermarket. These applications also require extensive car parking provision and road infrastructure to be put in place and it would be much better for the environment and local neighbourhoods that they are located, where possible, in town centres."
Mr Craig, who has began a leaflet drop amongst local residents to gauge their reaction, added: "To put this proposal into context, the size of this supermarket is larger than the current Tesco store in Lisburn. It would be a massive superstore in an area that will be entirely residential in nature impacting on an entire neighbourhood and generating significant problems in terms of traffic, noise, visual impact and a range of issues that come with putting this type of facility in a residential area.
"This application has been submitted without the applicant having any discussions with me or other colleagues who represent this area."
Mr Craig said the area was zoned for residential purposes not retail development.
A local resident said everyone in the area was shocked by the application.
She commented: "We're really concerned about this superstore. Nobody seems to be willing to say who is going to go there.
"They widened the road and built a new roundabout nearby and we wondered why. Everyone said, 'why widen the road for no reason?' Nobody asked for it; it is almost as if things have already been put in place, certainly if there was a food store there a roundabout would be needed."
The resident added: "The traffic and noise and whole general disruption caused by a superstore would be a nightmare. It would be 24 hours a day. At the moment I can look out over hedgerows and trees, and it is very peaceful, but that amount of traffic would be a nightmare. It would completely change the nature of why we bought a house here. At the moment you don't hear a car at night, but all that would change."
An article 31 has been applied to the application requiring the Minister for the Environment to have the final decision and the Council will now officially be writing to the Planning Service and the Department expressing its serious reservations about the application.
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Friday 25 May 2012
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