FROME Town Council recommended refusal on the outline planning application to build a supermarket, shops, offices, car parking, hotel and a public square on derelict land at Saxonvale in Frome last night.
Nine town councillors voted for refusal, two against with one abstention. The application will now go to Mendip District Council who will take into account the local recommendation and come to a decision at a planning committee meeting either in February or March.
A packed Assembly Rooms took the chance to thrash out the controversial application put forward by Milton-Keynes based developers Frontier Estates Ltd. They want to develop a 2.5 hectare site which belongs to Notts Industries and Mendip District Council and currently is home to unused factory buildings, the car park and abattoir building next to Saxonvale.
But the feeling among the majority of town councillors was although they wanted to see the derelict land developed, this application was far too generic and could be built in any town in the country.
This feeling was echoed by long-time resident Duncan Skene who describe Frome as an exceptional town.
He said: "Frome has a long history of dissention and non-conformity and it would be wrong to impose open Frome something you could find in any town anywhere; we are not Trowbridge nor Shepton Mallet, Frome is an exceptional town and deserves better."
There were major concerns about the links between the proposed development and the town centre, the scale of the supermarket and congestion at a number of junctions.
However town councillors Eve Berry and Nick White voted for the application and warned this rejection could be a missed opportunity.
Mr White said: "At last we have got a development that is both realistic and deliverable."
He said the opening of a town centre supermarket would encourage people back into the town and that there was a huge amount of support in favour of the development.
Although the official end of the public consultation is today comments can still be submitted and considered up to the time that a district council decision is made.
A meeting staged by Keep Frome Local on Tuesday night resulted in 101 letters of objection to the application which have been handed into Mendip District Council.
The application can be viewed on the council website by searching for application number 2013/2260.
Read more: http://www.fromestandard.co.uk/Frome-Town-Council-says-proposed-town-centre/story-20494477-detail/story.html#ixzz2rLwZMBHg
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