Planning Reports
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Application No : 03/02718/FULL1 Ward: Kelsey And Eden Park Address : Tesco Stores Ltd Croydon Road Conservation Area:NO Beckenham Kent BR3 4AA OS Grid Ref: E: 535737 N: 168194 Applicant : Tesco Stores Ltd Objections : YES Description of Development: Enlargement of retail store site to include adjacent land to south and site of demolished railway substation, and single storey extensions to store, decked car park over existing car park and extension of surface car park (to increase number of parking spaces from 393 to 564), realignment of access road to service yard, and relocation of service yard, recycling facilities, staff car park and sprinkler tank/pump building 7 0 78 72 PO Pa th FB LB C 5 R 7 33. 4m CF Car 5 Pa rk 4 Pa th H C d n U 3 5 5 2 7 TCB th a P South Norwood Country Park ta ll 2 El me rs En d Ha 9 S 3 b 1 u S Free Ch urch R l C E 1 3 in a r in D ra 8 D 3 34. 4m y 2 d 5 B y B d BM 3 4.9 4m L B d 2 2 r 33. 3m 3 a 1 W 1 1 2 9 7 G 8 O 3 D 1 D 5 A R h SP t D a P R O A 2 D 5 D 0 OA 1 N R O Y D RO 5 C 3 t h 7 k . a n 2 P l i m m ra Su p erst ore T 3 5 El Sub St a 0 2 in ra D El Sub St a F C 2 LB 2 4 2 m .5 5 3 ef D 5 4 a t S b u S l E M 1 P 3 1 1 . 2 5 Al lo tmen t Gard en s 7 2 9 2 5 2 El Su b Sta 9 Wo rks 1 5 1 D ra m i 6 n . 7 0 4 M B d n 6 40. 2m U d a o in e a R t h r a t c k D n Wo rks s n o i o d E f Recre ati on G ro u nd o 5 f y l f e a r o i a D r r B t h C s C d u n d n U I CF This map is reproduced from Ordnance Survey material with the permission of Ordnance Survey on behalf of the Controller of Her Majesty’s Stationery Office © Crown Copyright. Unauthorised reproduction infringes Crown Copyright and may lead to prosecution or civil proceedings. London Borough of Bromley. Lic. No. 100017661 Joint Report 03/02718 and 05/01853 Consideration of these applications was deferred by the Committee on 30th August for a site visit and in view of concerns about and need for further consideration of the following – the transport impact/increase in traffic congestion need for the bus terminus possible use of the site for “windfall” housing development. Tesco’s consultants gave a brief presentation to Members on these matters prior to the site visit. They are dealt with in this report, including in the Conclusions which summarise the traffic issue and refers to officers searches in the recent past for a site for provision of a bus terminal, which has been considered a desirable objective for public transport at Elmers End. There is no policy requirement for housing on this site, and lack of it could not form a refusal ground. Clearly there are some matters of concern regarding the applications, but none are sufficient to alter the recommendations. Proposal These sites are located at the junction of Croydon and Elmers End Roads, adjacent to Elmers End station (served by National Rail and Tramlink services). The existing retail store was opened in June 1995 and has its vehicular access from a roundabout built to serve it and industrial sites on the opposite side of Croydon Road. The supermarket has gross floorspace of 5066 sq.m. (54,532 sq. ft.), with a 400 space car park and a petrol filling station. The site area is about 3.29 hectares (8.13 acres). In addition to the forms and drawings, this application for the supermarket site is accompanied by the following material – Planning and Retail Statement (Montagu Evans, Chartered Surveyors - agents for the applicant) Supplementary Retail Statement, regarding potential effect on Addiscombe Road local centre in Croydon Borough (Montagu Evans) Landscape Supporting Statement (Epcad, Ecology and Landscape Planning) Transport Assessment (Boreham, Consulting Engineers). The agents state the following in their covering letter – "The Tesco store at Elmers End is very popular and consequently suffers from the consequence of overtrading, principally overcrowding. This application proposes major improvements to the store, including more circulation space for customers., and also more room to display stock to enable improved product availability. The back-up areas of the store will also be significantly improved so that more stock can be delivered to the store, again ensuring improved product availability for shoppers and also for those who choose to use Tesco's popular internet grocery ordering service. Further improvements to the store are planned, including enhanced product ranges to include limited ranges of non-food goods, similar to those already available in other large food stores across the area. Full details of all of these improvements are set out in the Planning and Retail Statement submitted in support of this application. The second application concerns the creation of a new bus interchange adjacent to the existing National Rail and Tramlink station, at a cost to Tesco Stores Ltd. approaching £2m, to include land assembly, construction and highways works. This will be created on land which is in the majority ownership of Tesco Stores Ltd., a small amount of land (approximately 400 sq.m.) is in the ownership of the London Borough of Bromley. It is assumed that the Council will vest this land at no cost in order to secure the successful development of the bus interchange. However, as a landowner, the Borough Council will need to be a party to any legal obligation governing the provision of this facility. The bus station will be accessed via a new signalised junction from Elmers End Road. Both the interchange and junction will be laid out by Tesco Stores Ltd. and then the facility will be handed to Transport for London on a long lease at a peppercorn rent. Transport for London will be responsible for fitting out the interchange with its standard street furniture. It is anticipated that, by creating this facility and improving interchange possibilities, the opportunity will be presented for more shoppers to visit the store by public transport, and that the whole community - whether they use the store or not - will also benefit from a much-enhanced public transport interchange." A Section 106 Agreement is proposed regarding – transferring a small area of Council-owned land to Tesco for the public transport interchange for a nominal sum paving the public transport interchange to standards required by TfL (the latter to be responsible for street furniture, ticket machines etc) transferring the public transport interchange to TfL on a long lease at a nominal rent off-site highway works to improve the signalised Croydon Road/Elmers End Road junction, and provide the signalised access to the public transport interchange The additional land which is proposed to be included in the extended supermarket and transport interchange sites is as follows – a roughly triangular shaped undeveloped area immediately adjacent to the south end of the service yard. This was envisaged to be used for business units (Classes B1, B2 and B8) under a requirement in the legal agreement of the 1993 outline planning permission, to the effect that efforts would be made to market the land for development for those purposes. The extensions for storage and staff facilities will be partly over the existing service yard and the new service yard will extend onto the undeveloped land. a large brick former transformer building that previously supplied electricity to the railway tracks has been demolished by the applicants, after purchase of its site from Network Rail. This was included in the Council's list of buildings of local architectural or historic interest, and this part of the site is proposed for additional surface car parking. land formerly owned by Network Rail, the Council and Railtrack adjacent to the downside platform at the station, together with an adjacent site bounded by metal palisade fencing and previously used for car storage and then a garden centre - this is the land that will form the transport interchange (together with some additional surface parking for the supermarket). The small area of Council-owned land was left over from the widening/replacement of the road bridge over the rail tracks at the north end of the station. The proposals are essentially as described above, with the extensions to the trading floorspace of the supermarket as follows – small additions on the western side and north-west corner on the eastern side, necessitating realignment of the access road to the service yard and the relocation of the recycling facility (adjacent to the service yard, remote from the extended car park used by shoppers). The extensions will increase the gross floorspace to 7516 sq.m. (80,902 sq.ft.), from 5066 sq.m. The following gives a summary of the floorspace breakdown in sq.m. – Existing Store Extended Increase Store Food Hall 2484 3525 1041 Non Food 56 771 715 Customer Services (including cafe & toilets) 280 496 216 Checkouts 384 492 109 Total of publicly accessible areas 3204 5284 2080 The Planning and Retail Statement is a comprehensive document that mainly deals with retail impact issues as follows – • examines existing large foodstore provision in the catchment area, in Elmers End, Beckenham, Penge, West Wickham, Bromley and Croydon • sets out results of surveys by independent market research companies of customers at the existing Tesco store and of households living in the main/primary catchment area, defined as 10 minutes of peak drive time • assesses the quantitative capacity for additional convenience business retail floorspace within the catchment area of the Tesco store at Elmers End, as part of the consideration of "need".