Wells receives trio of supermarket planning applications

By redlight | Tuesday, February 23, 2010, 21:49

You know how it is, you wait ages for a new supermarket to come to the city, then three come along at once.

Supermarkets coming to Wells?

With Morrisons confirming its intention to submit a planning application to open a new site on the old Clares Factory site on East Somerset way we want to hear your views on whether you’d welcome:

1 The Somerfield application

2 Sainsbury’s application for the Tincknells site

3 Waitrose’s application for the EMI site or

4 None of them

There’s no doubt, the new jobs created would be especially welcome in this financial climate. Conservative figures would suggest that a minimum of 50 retail positions become available with the opening of a new store and there would also be significant numbers of construction, engineering & building opportunities too.

Three new supermarkets happily means three times the number of jobs. Three times as much choice regarding products & pricing, and thus extra power to the people. Each brand is unlikely to want to compete for market share under such adverse conditions however.

A sad casualty of a successful Waitrose application were successful, would be the EMI Club as a live music venue & twin skittle alley establishment. Residents are naturally also concerned about the impact of additional infrastructure required to facilitate customers driving and parking for all three applications. The traffic lights through the centre of town seem to follow their own whimsical rhythms at the best of times, often leading to ridiculously long and completely unnecessary tail-backs.

There has been significant public support voiced for the Sainsburys application and particularly so regarding the Waitrose consultation with over 90% supporting the proposal and Mendip District Council will be considering their decision regarding these two in mid-march. It will be interesting to see how the Morrisons bid is received in light of these other two and whether they manage to submit their application before the council decides on the other two.

What are your views on the proposals for our city? I don’t doubt you have strong opinions and I’d welcome you to sign-up & share them with us.

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Comments

There is no doubt in my mind that the Sainsburys redevelopment of the Tincknells site would resolve what is a dreadful parking problem at the health centre. Generally I am against supermarket development as it obviously kills local shops but it looks like one is going to come...Waitrose is way too expensive for anything, and why would we want Morrisons when it is just down the road in Glastonbury?
Has anyone done a survey on whether there is likely to be enough trade to support another supermarket`/

By Ammaprema at 21:57 on 15/03/10
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If it were up to me (which it isn't), then I would advise MDC to accecpt all three and let the companies battle it out for which one of the sites to be built! After all, market forces are the real governing factor..... let these companies spend their legal budgets arguing in court over who can build what!!

By mow633 at 12:14 on 02/03/10
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That's a fair point Wellie. To be honest, Tesco is where it is because the standard of product is higher than at Morrison's, and is cheaper than Sainsbury's. But then again, if you shop in the Wells Tesco followed by the Shepton Tesco, the Wells one seems antiquated and cramped in comparison.

Tesco/Morrison's/Sainsbury's are all similar so I would like the Waitrose to go alongside Tesco. The only downside of that is the loss of the EMI Club skittles alleys.

By TimothyL12 at 09:23 on 01/03/10
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I receive my doorstep delivery of veggies & meat from the Riverford box scheme and to be honest, I don't know whether it makes any difference who sells me my Persil tabs etc But I am not not keen that Tesco becomes anymore powerful than it already is but at the same time I would hate for a plethora of supermarkets ploughing in and then shipping out again if the market is insufficient to support them.

By WellieWonka at 21:01 on 28/02/10
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Harehey you make a very good point, when I arrived in the area 8 or 9 years ago, there were two greengrocers on the high street and a Bottoms-Up which have subsequently gone bust. I wish I could remember what other casualties there have been in Wells - can anyone help me out here?

By redlight at 16:31 on 26/02/10
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