the No Mill Road Tesco Campaign

CAMPAIGNERS against plans for a Tesco store in Cambridge’s Mill Road have been given a last-minute stay of execution.

Planning chiefs at Cambridge City Council have taken the scheme off the table for Thursday night’s east area committee after deciding the report did not go into the issues in enough detail.

The decision has only just been made – taking campaigners and the supermarket giant by surprise.

Tesco has applied for permission to extend the former Wilco building in Mill Road and install new signs and a cash machine to create an Express store.

Planning officers had recommended the plans for approval despite a massive public backlash against the idea.

More than 5,000 people have signed a petition against the plans, and more than 1,100 have written letters of objection.

Campaigners were expected to turn out in force to protest at Thursday’s council meeting which had been booked into a larger venue – St Philip’s Church in Mill Road – to make room for the large numbers of people expected.

But now the council has decided the planning reports were “not comprehensive” enough and said the applications will be debated another day.

The No Mill Road Tesco campaign submitted a complaint to the council saying the report was “flawed” .

A spokesman for the campaign said: “We are glad that the council have taken our concerns seriously with regard to the incomplete planners’ report.”

Cambridge Evening News, 16th January 2008, 5pm

The decisions about Tesco’s planning applications will now NOT be made at the meeting on Thursday 17th January, so you don’t need to come along at 7.30pm to the church. The East Area Committee itself will still meet as planned but the Tesco items will not be discussed.

The planning department have upheld a complaint by the No Mill Road Tesco Campaign to Simon Payne, the Director of Environment and Planning at the Cambridge City Council, about the inadequacy of the planning report and recommendation.

The report by planners currently recommends approval of the Tesco’s applications and was meant to be the basis for decision-making at the meeting.

The complaint made by the No Mill Road Tesco campaign was that this report is incomplete and fails to address most of the local residents’ objections to the store.

We regret that little notice has been given for the cancellation. Please pass on this news to all who might have been planning to attend.

More news will be available shortly.

The East Area Committee was due to have an additional meeting on the ‘Tesco planning applications’, at St Philips Church, 185 Mill Road on Thursday 17th January 2008.

The agenda documents for this were as follows (those in bold are of most importance to us):

• Main agenda paper
  
  • 07/0809/ADV 163 – 167 Mill Road (Installation of one double sided internally illuminated projecting sign and one internally illuminated fascia sign.)
  • 07/0810/FUL 163 – 167 Mill Road (Installation of new shopfront including ATM Unit.)
  • 07/0811/FUL 163 – 167 Mill Road (Erection of single storey rear extension and installation of plant)
  • Replacement Section 8.2 to 8.10 of the previously published report (pages 43 to 45)
• Agenda 2 (covered other, non-Tesco matters, so is not relevant)

The main papers were published on 10th January, a week before the meeting. The replacement section was published a few days before the meeting.

On 15th January, we submitted a formal complaint to officers concerning the report.

On 16th January, our complaint was upheld by the Planning department. As a result, the reports were withdrawn from the agenda and so not considered at the meeting.