Council must reject Clarendon Arcade

Many local people do not realise the sheer scale and size of the proposal. The footprint of the development site is 3.3 times the area of the existing Chandos Street car park. The original planning brief was for the development of the car park area. The current proposal goes hugely beyond the original planning brief (as recorded in Grimley report/DTZ study and council minutes).

We will give our own houses in Clarendon Avenue as an example of the impact of the development on local residents. The wall of the shopping centre would be just one metre from our rear garden wall. It is under five metres from the kitchens and rear bedrooms of our houses to that garden wall! The lack of concern for residents in the plan is staggering. Every tiny bit of land would be used up by the developer to make room for the massive building, with no concern for residents.

The proposed development would be 50 feet high, which is completely out of proportion with surrounding buildings in the immediate vicinity and elsewhere in our Regency/Victorian town centre. Residential properties in Clarendon Avenue, Chandos Street (including the sheltered housing in Chandos Court), as well as William and George Houses, would lose light and privacy. Residents would suffer greatly during the extensive period of demolition and building. Our own houses would lose a very significant amount of sunlight, with the building looming over our properties.

Are local people fully aware that they would lose three streets - Guy Place West, Oxford Row and most of Guy Street – and that properties and businesses would be the victims of compulsory purchase and demolition? The shopping centre would be closed in the evenings, effectively depriving pedestrians of access to a large area in the north of the town.

Supply vehicles would increase the noise to surrounding properties as would the general increase of traffic in the area. There would be a very significant increase in noise level, exhaust pollution and particle emission. Currently, Chandos Street car park has about 150 spaces; rising to about 180 spaces, including the on-street parking in the three roads that would be engulfed by the proposed development. The development provides 540 car-parking places. The developers are therefore expecting to treble the number of cars coming to the area. Not only would the development dramatically increase travel by private car in this area but also the closure of three roads would intensify the traffic on the remaining nearby roads. In addition there would be large delivery trucks being driven through the area to the development to service the shops. The pressure on Chandos St and Clarendon Avenue would be enormous.

Existing businesses in the Guy St/Guy Place West/Oxford Row area bring diversity to the shopping scene of Leamington and provide services that are highly valued by residents and other users of the town. These distinctive businesses would be removed by compulsory purchase, demolished, and replaced by clone town chain stores.

The proposed development is simply too big in size and scale, and comes much too close to residential properties. The plan flies in the face of Warwick District Council’s own guidelines of 2006 which refer to ‘a scheme that it is in harmony with the character of the town’ and which require that ‘scale and massing must be carefully and sensitively considered’. In no way could the plan be said to ‘preserve or enhance the Conservation Area’.

These facts have been recognised by the town council, the Leamington Society and the Central Leamington Residents’ Association who have registered their own objections to the district council. Moreover, there has been an overwhelming number of objections by Leamington people, and by others from the surrounding area, submitted to the planning authority. If ‘localism’ means anything, the district council planning committee must pay heed to these objections and reject the application. - Robert and Rosemary Jackson & Oliver and Jenny Murray-Bates, Clarendon Avenue, Leamington.