Before Tesco - Teme Bridge Congestion

HGV mounts pavement behind disability scooter.
(Click to enlarge picture).

The reworked Teme Bridge has certainly seen work undertaken, but it's now even narrower in places than in the past. Many in the town have seen HGV's mounting the pavements in the past to try and get around the bend in the bridge but here's another example [above] which happened recently despite 'improvements' to the bridge. Of concern in this example is the senior citizen in the disability scooter who is clearly unaware of the large HGV looming-up behind him while it tries to get around the bend in the bridge. Issues around congestion and safety of pedestrians on the structure have been voiced before and clearly aren't going away .


The bridge has always seen busier periods in the day - this image showing just one of these in a late morning on a weekday. Tenbury Futures have long raised concerns about the Teme bridge's ability to cope with the growing modern traffic numbers if faces and here is just one of many ongoing snarl-ups caught on camera.. It's worthwhile pointing out of course that all this is happening before either any works are carried-out on the town's cattle market site or increases brought on by subsequent store traffic.. 


We raised the spectre of "Massive additional congestion" on our past posters in the town if a supermarket was given the go-ahead.. The bridge is clearly suffering issues around both traffic and safety of pedestrians even before a supermarket build - were we right to raise concerns? 

Tenbury's Last Chance...

Dear Planning Committee Members,

You have a critically important decision to make on
7th March.

Just over a year ago, after a long and careful discussion, your committee refused permission for a large supermarket to be built on the cattle market site in Tenbury. You have now been asked to change that decision: please, please don’t. There have been no real changes to the application and the decision should be the same – a refusal. 

To do otherwise, would be inconsistent and unjustified. We are very lucky to have a diverse and vital high street in Tenbury; but make no mistake, it is very fragile and would not survive the effects of a large supermarket being built in the town.

• The current bridge closure, a minor event in comparison, has cost traders up to 50% of their turnover during the closure.

• Your own local plan says that we need only 18 sq M of additional food retail space – the application is for nearly 80 times that amount – far more than all of the current food retail space in Tenbury

• The Council for the Protection of Rural England has concluded that “it will have a strong adverse impact on the traders in the town and duplicate services offered”.

In these difficult times jobs are precious and any jobs lost are difficult, if not impossible, to replace.

• The British Retail Planning Forum, which is financed by the supermarkets themselves, has found that every time a large supermarket opens, on average, 276 jobs are lost.

• These figures suggest that if the development goes ahead we will lose about 100 jobs in Tenbury – that is a net loss of about 100 jobs.

The development will have a catastrophic effect on the conservation area and the historical setting.

• This committee thought so last year and refused permission

• The council’s own Conservation Officer describes it as a “large, single span, semi- industrial building” that will “certainly impact upon the Conservation Area”.

• English Heritage recommend that permission be refused

• The Council for British Archaeology is against the development

• The Civic Society has said, a “supermarket of this size ……. cannot be made to fit visually in a historic setting, particularly as this proposal requires the demolition of an important historic building”

• The Victorian Society is against the demolition of the Old Infirmary and so against the development


• Your own planning officers say that it would be “regrettable” to demolish the RBB building for this development – avoid those regrets and refuse permission, we will never be able to get it back

There are many other concerns...

• There are many, very real concerns about safety on the roads and pavements around the development – there has been an accident on the site in the last few weeks involving a car and a supermarket lorry

• A recent traffic survey has shown that more than 1,600 traffic movements already take place between 5pm and 7pm at this end of Teme Street

• The development does not provide anything like enough parking – the proposal is well below the national minimum standards


• There is not even room for a trolley to be placed behind a shopper's car whilst the shopping is being loaded into the car’s boot without impeding the traffic on the proposed access road

• There is no answer to how the bridge, a scheduled ancient monument, will cope with the extra traffic (estimated at up to 2,000 crossings per day by cars and many more by large delivery lorries) – when it fails to cope, as it frequently must, Tenbury will be regularly gridlocked

• Have no doubt about the strength of feeling in and around Tenbury. There have been many hundreds of written objections and only a handful of letters in support of this unnecessary and damaging development.

And finally...

Tesco has no interest in or understanding of Tenbury as a place in its own right, and, it would seem, has little respect for our local authorities.

Please refuse permission for this wholly unnecessary development that would do so much damage, in so many ways, to Tenbury. Make no mistake, the damage would be permanent.

The future vitality of the town's highstreet is in your hands. It is your decision.

Interim Analysis: 29th Jan 2011

Overview Graph [Please Click to Enlarge].
• 32 Additional returned forms.
• Based on a new total of 120 form returns.
• Copies of all forms will be passed to both MHDC and Tenbury Town Council end Feb/early March for ref in further discussions on the site.
• All reported figures represented here can also be double-checked via these copies if required by both organisations. 

Geographical Response Area:
• Additional responses from: [mainly] Tenbury and also Burford, Ludlow, Eastham, St Michaels, Milson nr Cleobury Mortimer, Rochford, Oldwood Common, Lindridge Priory, Brimfield, Upper Sapey and Kington.

Supporting Graphs relating to the 6x Suggestions on the Community Form [Please Click to Enlarge]

Interim Analysis: 25th January 2011

Collected 25th Jan 2011 from participating Tenbury shops. These interim statistics from a sample of 88 completed forms.

We will add further interim details [added to those below] at another point in February to keep a track of the returns coming in.

Geographic Response Area:
• Responses mainly from Tenbury but with individuals from surrounding settlements such as: Burford, Ludlow, Clifton-on-Teme, Cleobury Mortimer, Sutton, Eardiston, Little Hereford, Frith Common, Stoke Bliss, St Michaels, Upper Sapey, Bredenbury and [out of the 88] one from each of the following: Knighton, Bayton nr Kidderminster, Kingsland and Staffordshire. 

Supporting Individual Responses
• Accuracy to within + or - 2 counts per option on recording.