No joy for Lidl at Castle Irwell
The supermarket chain has been refused permission to build a 23,400 sq ft store off Cromwell Road in Salford within Salboy’s 500-home redevelopment of the former student village.
Plans for the Charlestown store were lodged in April but Lidl’s request for planning permission was turned down by the city council this week.
A report compiled by Salford’s principal planning officer David Allen said Lidl’s proposals “fail to respond to and sit sympathetically within its physical context and respect the positive character of the local area and urban form around Charlestown roundabout.”
In addition, the report said the scheme would “weaken the positive and high-quality urban design attributes of the emerging [Castle Irwell] neighbourhood”.
Lidl also tasted defeat in Wavertree recently. The company withdrew its plans to knock down the former Abbey Cinema on Church Road North and build a supermarket after the building was listed, scuppering the project.
In March, Lidl lodged an application to build a store at Mocha Parade off Lower Broughton Road, around one mile from the Castle Irwell site.
A decision on that application is yet to be made.
Lead contractor Domis is on site building the first phase of homes at Salboy’s £120m development, plans for which were approved last summer.
Great news!! A low density, car-centric supermarket this close to the city centre was a massive step backwards in my opinion. Let’s have a supermarket with less parking (or underground) and apartments above to create a proper high density feel.
By Anonymous
Residents will just have to drive to other supermarkets
By YS
LIDI is a great “Cheap as chips’ supermarket along with ALDI. The supermarket chain might go back to the drawing board and come back with new different alternative plans for the castle irwell site.
By Darren born bred.
This is a large community and getting larger by the building of new properties so we could really use a local supermarket as not everyone drives and local public transport is dismal, but I agree that Lidl would have been a bit “down market” for an expanding area.
I would be interested to learn if any commercial ventures are to be included in the new building project.
By Resident.
This is either going to become a dense, lively area or a car-dependent suburban drudge. A one-story supermarket is an inefficient use of space in this location. Build it, but add a few storeys on top.
By Density
There is no high street in that area so a supermarket there is probably needed. We are not talking Chorlton or Prestwich. The facilities around there are dismal. It would be nice to see the gentrification of the hardly known gem which is the nearby, The Cliff. That area is ripe for some decent bars and independent shops.
By Elephant
At last, someone using their urbanist brain. No problem with Lidl and Aldi, but these guys need to get out of cookie cutter development in urban settings. Arguably their format sits really well between convenience and full service supermarket, with pricing that works for a range of customers.
By Rich X
Great news. A Lidl supermarket will do really well here but they need to put some thought into the design and layout. Central Salford has been blighted for too long with ugly poorly planned neighbourhoods with tall metal fencing, busy, hostile roads and ugly open space. Well done to Salford’s planners for insisting on a bit of quality here at what is a really prominent site.
By Mancunian in exile
‘Resident’ there, displaying the snobbery unfortunately not uncommon amongst the British public. Where I live residents moaned and moaned about an Aldi being developed on the basis that it wasn’t the sort of thing they wanted where they lived, until it was built and then they flocked to the place in their droves. I’ve even stood behind someone in a queue at the tills who told someone on the other end of the phone she was in Waitrose – priceless!
The problem here is not that it’s Lidl, but that it’s an inappropriate design and layout for the area. If supermarkets are that important to an area, as others suggest, then they’re important enough to have some proper thought put into those aspects of their development. Who the operator is, is irrelevant (not least because once you’ve granted permission for it, any retailer can operate out of it, so you can hammer on about wanting a Booth’s all you like, but when they change their minds at any point, there’s nothing to stop Asda operating out of the space).
By OldTom
Lidl too downgrade for Broughton? Wow, I’ve heard it all now!!
By Realist