Hi, I've been following the Tesco stuff and finally decided to aded a few comments of my own ...
I thought we lived in a democracy, so how come a small group of people (ie the College Governors) can irrevocably change the face of Marple without any public consultation whatsoever. The bids for the sale of the Hibbert Lane campus are all from large supermarkets (Tesco, Sainsbury’s Waitrose), not one from a housing developer. This part of Marple is not zoned for retail use by the Council, but there are Councillors who are Governors, how did this happen?
Surely we need more affordable housing for young families and retired people in Marple, and this would be an ideal spot, perhaps alongside a community centre which we desperately need, and a health centre. As adjacent land is zoned for housing use by the council surely this would be a more acceptable solution.
In High Peak the council give guidance on land values for different class uses, these are of course approximate, but a helpful indication of what the land would sell for with the relevant planning permission. Land with planning permission for housing sells for more than twice that with retail/leisure permission. I have asked Stockport council, but they do not give these guidelines as land costs vary so widely across the Borough. BUT it seems strange to me that on land zoned for housing by the council and that could possibly be more valuable for that use, not a single known bid has been received. I suppose the argument is that the land is worth what someone is prepared to pay. So come on all you housing developers lets have some bids.
I agree that we probably do need another supermarket to serve the size of population we have in Marple, but this should be of the right scale and located amongst the other shops. The empty Hanbury’s site would be ideal, or as I hear the Iceland company is up for sale, replace that, or even on the Somerfield (which is now a second Co-op) Texaco site. One of the arguments that the large supermarkets will use is that there is no competition to the Co-op in Marple – and they are right in this respect. If the Co-op could be persuaded to forego their stranglehold on Marple and a suitable sized development in the retail zone could happen then this would be of benefit to households IN MARPLE and would increase footfall for the whole town centre which would benefit the independent shops.
If a larger supermarket is built on Hibbert Lane this will pull in people from outside Marple, causing more congestion on the roads, which no doubt will be enlarged to accommodate the increased traffic flows – pity the poor householders on Hibbert Lane, and what will happen to the value of their property? It will pull shoppers away from Market Street which will mean the decline of the independent shops there. I’m sure there will be a pedestrian walkway in the proposal, but let’s face it would you walk from Hibbert Lane to Market Street, having loaded up with a weekly shop, especially in winter or if it’s raining – I doubt it. Also consider the effect on the local economy, money spent in local shops gets re-spent in other local shops up to six times, whereas money spent in supermarkets leaves the local economy. I am aware that job creation will be a consideration, but independent shops and businesses as a whole are the biggest employment sector in the UK. Don’t even get me started on how much data supermarkets gather by using clubcards, check out CRUCIBLE database on Google – talk about big brother. You might be interested to know that in under six miles from Marple centre there are approximately 60 supermarkets and convenience stores.
Whilst I understand the College need money, I think we should demand a halt to proceedings until all avenues have been explored and the residents and businesses in Marple have been consulted. It seems to me that the citizens of Marple are suffering for the college’s bad housekeeping.
BE UNDER NO ILLUSION - once the land has been sold to Teso, Sainsbury’s or Waitrose, whether planning permission is refused or not – a supermarket will be built and MARPLE WILL CHANGE FOREVER. The large supermarkets know the appeal process inside out and there are only so many objections the planning dept can raise and afford to raise (the appeal process costs millions of taxpayers money), so it’s only a matter of time before they finally get the permission to build. Believe me I have seen it happen in other places, and there is plenty of evidence on the Tescopoly website - and for those of who you who think Tesco et al are the friendly shop on the corner – follow the link on this forum to the Channel 4 Dispatches documentary about the supermarket that ate Britain.
Let us band together and call for a public consultation about the use of this land before it’s too late – and a public enquiry into the state of the College’s finances, because it’s that that’s created this situation and they are and should be accountable.
