I got it wrong!
Clearly this is now history and I got it wrong, but it is still worth reading as an alternative that would be considerably less intrusive.
What might Tesco do?
18th May 2009
First a few facts:
- The bulk of us the residents of Belper want a new road, a bypass of some form, the A6 through the town is a nightmare and dangerous.
- The County Council want a new library nearer the town centre; they also want the money from the existing building, etc.
- Tesco own the Thornton‘s land and it is brown field so the planning regulations are much easier for them.
- The valley is a world heritage site and that should mean anything new built will have to be in keeping and architecturally good!
The Route South from Triangle to Morrison‘s Island
I am presenting here one of the possibilities I believe Tesco might propose. Some of this I do not like and some of it I do but that is another story.
The new entrance for the road at the Triangle is a set of traffic lights; Bridge Street is realigned to go straight onto Bridge Foot. The Matlock Road (A6) curves round to go between Pims and Christ Church before turning left to go south. This will do little damage; Pims, the protected tree and Christ Church will all be left untouched. The football and cricket pitches will both move down the meadow to allow the road through.
The sports clubs will get some money, a new clubhouse and pavilion in exchange for the land one possible location is shown in orange on the image below. The Environment Agency may want the road raising eighteen inches but they might not as the Triangle is roughly the same level and might flood before the new road.
Some housing will be built on the site of the existing Cricket Pavilion in front of the existing flats (Shown in yellow) shielding them from the noise and offering fantastic views, over the road and the meadow. These will probably make the sports ground changes cost neutral for Tesco.
Ahead is the industrial area and two choices exist for the road. Go right along the meadows edge, just on the higher ground. If this is done everybody on the meadow would notice every vehicle passing because it would be above ground level and it would be difficult to provide any shielding against the noise. Or go straight on down the side of the Unity Mill site and the old Thornton‘s factory. This second route produces less noise pollution by the river and less routing problems at the south end because it leads straight through between Focus and DeBradley. I think the straight on option is the one that will be chosen and is what I have shown. However, detouring round the site potentially raises the value of the site by not splitting it up into smaller areas.
This route divides the site into four pieces; the largest piece is north of Derwent Street and to the west of the new road (Blue), the smallest piece north of Derwent Street and east of the new road (Cyan). I am going to consider the other two pieces because that I think is what Tesco will do. To the west of the new road are a rash of small businesses all in a run down and dilapidated state (Green) and the Dance School. To the east of the new road is the old Thornton‘s factory complex (Red).
The factory complex is more than large enough for the superstore and is virtually a walled enclosure over two stories high. I suspect the store will be here with parts of the existing brick facades retained and with new stone and brick infill where necessary. Add a few small shopping units in the Derwent Street facade and the planners will love it! The western area then becomes the car park and yes the new road goes between the two. That‘s not a problem; just make the front of the store below the road. The store floor goes down a few feet and the road goes up a few and everything just works. The two stories of the superstore will be easier to fit inside the shell with the ground floor lowered slightly. Please remember the site is not flat and it is reconstructed industrial land so some of the contamination will have to be removed to satisfy the environmental laws. Further, some infill will be needed by the new road at the north end of the site even if it is not raised.
Those who live on the Chevin and in Mount Pleasant will be able to see the car park but the store will just be inside existing buildings so as long as they get the roof detail correct, unlike Focus, it will be invisible. Don‘t believe me, find the picture to the left in the picture at the top of the page, it‘s just above Focus. The dance school is surrounded by car parking which nicely solves one of their problems and car parking looks like a clean version of what is currently on this part of the site. Therefore I suspect the planning Department will be able to say little about this part of the plan.
The new library building might already exists, it‘s the new mill like building by the Unity Mill site, yes Tesco own it that why it‘s empty. It is shown as a small green square on the plan just north of Derwent Street and it will be opposite the new small units.
North and east of Derwent Street, behind the library, is just as easy it‘s a petrol station and small commercial units so the existing businesses have the option to stay. I personally would like the Lion Garage to get the site but Tesco will definitely want it.
It‘s the area to the north and west of Derwent Street where I am at a bit of a loss (Blue). It‘s as big as the Tesco site, its brown field, currently underused warehousing. It could become housing, factory or warehouse space, possibly include a tourist hotel, I don‘t know enough about the current market to make a judgement, two years ago it would just have been housing. Here is the area where I think we can make the biggest impact, what do we want?
Finally, the road goes between Focus and DeBradley and takes the end off the Methodist Church Hall to joins up with the junction at the Derby Road Island. The alignment through here will need to be changed slightly to allow the traffic to flow more freely and in my opinion the island should be replaced by a set of three way traffic lights. Chapel Street should have such a low level of through traffic that it should not need to be part of the main junction but a side road off New Road mainly used by local traffic and busses.
So potentially the only significant buildings demolished will be replaced by more modern equivalents with better facilities.