Lidl cues up Croxteth consent

The redevelopment of a community fire station site is recommended for approval, along with the overhaul of children’s hospice Claire House and Liverpool FC’s bid to make permanent the closure of a section of Anfield Road to cars.

Liverpool City Council’s planning committee meets on Tuesday 30 June, and will also be asked to consider a retrospective application for the Invisible Wind Factory venue.

Lidl, Croxteth – application 25F/1621

Continuing its expansion drive, discount grocer Lidl lodged its plans for the Merseyside Fire & Rescue site on Storrington Avenue in September last year.

The site, as set out in the officer report for committee members, is vacant and sits within a predominantly residential area, being designated in planning terms partly as residential and partly open space.

Lidl intends to develop around three acres of the wider 6.8-acre site. Typically for the group, the building proposed is around 23,500 sq ft in total, of which roughly 16,300 sq ft would be the actual sales area. There would be 120 car parking spaces.

Officers summed up that “the proposal represents the effective reuse of a brownfield site and would not result in the loss of functional open space.

“Although located outside a defined centre, in principle, it is accepted that there are no suitable and available sequentially preferable sites.”

Three letters of objection have been registered, and 35 letters of support.

Planner Rapleys leads a professional team also including HTC Architects, Enzygo, Miller Goodall, SCP and AWA.

Lidl and rival Aldi continue to be the most active movers in the UK grocery market, dominating new-build in the mid-size market segment between superstores and high street convenience.

Just this year, Lidl has triggered starts in Kirkby and Rusholme, south Manchester, submitted plans for stores in Flintshire and Stretford, and won an appeal against Stockport Council for a store in Cheadle Heath.

Claire House- application 26F/0364

Children’s hospice operator Claire House revealed plans earlier thus year to improve its West Derby site, to bring it up to the standard of care it provides at its Wirral base.

As Place reported in March, the project is designed by David Miller Architects. The extension to the former Carmelite Monastery will feature a new-build clinical pavilion with an undulating roof attached to the existing historic building via a link structure.

Later additions to the existing buildings would be cleared and replaced with modern therapy spaces including a hydrotherapy pool. The adjoining pavilion would feature bedrooms, end-of-life care suites, and staff and storage areas constructed around an internal garden.

Invisible Wind Factory – application 16F/2565

In something of an oddity, a consent is also expected for a change of use from industrial to performance venue/nightclub for the Invisible Wind Factory on Regent Road, a venue that has been operating for some years.

The proposal went to committee in January 2017, with a resolution to approve granted, but a legal agreement was never signed. Now, report officers, the application should be reassessed in line with the local plan, but without any requirements for Section 106 contributions.

Anfield expansion conditions – application 24F/2963

Finally, Liverpool FC’s proposals to amend conditions attached to the expansion of the Anfield Road stand will be considered. At present, July has to be kept free of events, a condition the club wants to add flexibility to, suggesting instead not a set period, but a 31-day respite period each summer.

The bid to change a further condition was added later, and required re-consultation – with three councillors, including both Anfield ward councillors, remaining opposed. Essentially, it relates to the requirement that the realigned section of the Anfield Road route, which is now in the private control of LFC, must be fully reopened after the works, as a condition of the stand’s expansion. However, designed as more of a plaza-style area as part of the redevelopment, it has never reopened to vehicles.

Those opposed say that closing the road to cars inconveniences residents and clogs other roads, with Cllr Billy Marrat stating that the continues closure “backtracks” on the earlier agreement.

However, LFC has in its corner Merseyside Police, which supports the bid on the bases that the current national security threat level is “substantial”.

Summing up, officers said that “in assessing the magnitude of the impact, the rerouting of traffic was found not to have substantial impacts on journey times or volumes of traffic in the surrounding streets” adding that while an alternative option of additional traffic management measures could have be pursued to allow the highway to open as originally intended, “the support for it remaining closed from a ground safety perspective weighs in favour of this proposal”.