The meeting was much as one would have expected with just the occasional unexpected twist.
Councillor Morrisson opened with introductions and the first question from the floor was a general attack on Sainsburys, the landlord and anything that would change the trading experience of the existing shopkeepers. It was pointed out that the landlord owns four of the shops; three of which it bought vacant and the fourth, The White Wood Shop was only vacant due to the lack of any payment of rent for over six months.
The first googly, however, was the fact that the letters that had gone out during the consultation period apparently only referred to 57-59 and the fact that 55 was now included seemed to be worse than some form of hate crime to some of the participants! It does however mean that the process was flawed and Geoff Whitington has proposed a short additional consultation period to correct their mistake.
The gentleman who posted the infamous poster stood up and made his 'Sainsbury's are capitalists who sell unhealthy food' rant and one or two other locals who have lived in Homor Oak for many years raised their concerns over changes to their high street, which was answered by a young couple who simply wanted the benefit of a local outlet that provided fresh vegetables, chicken breasts, a free cash machine and a wider selection of options. The father ans son who operate one of the stores and have done for thirty years voiced their extreme concerns at the potential damage to their livelihood and Carita from Sainsbury's offered to show aces studies which she brought, the nearest in Herne Hill, in which local tradesman has found that the opposite was indeed true and that their business had in fact improved. Of course we cannot know for sure how this will impact but ,as a young gentleman succinctly pointed out, this is not actually a planning issue and Geoff Whitington confirmed that the Council has no say in the end user of any commercial unit.
Matters that were raised that did have a material impact on the planning side were then raised, namely traffic, parking, deliveries and safety issues.
Sainsbury's representative pointed out that all their drivers have very high safety standards and are not allowed to reverse and that the deliveries would be made to the front of the shop using the existing loading bay and refuse would be take away on the same van ( 80% for re-cycling). There is one Sainsburys van per day and three others from outside sources providing fresh bread and milk and cigarettes and liquor. All will be outside peak hours, either early in the morning or later inthe evening. They are going to provide a statement on request from Mr. Whitington detailing their processes and this will be attached to the planning website.
It was pointed out that there are at present six residential units over the three properties and this number will be unchanged following the re configuration and therefore the parking impact is limited only to those shoppers who want to pull up to do a bit of shopping at whichever shop they choose and obviously limited to the existing spaces that are already available. Of course the fact that the road is fairly narrow was pointed out and the danger to pedestrians at the crossings was raised but this being a bus route already large vehicles clearly negotiate it successfully and Sainsbury's deliveries should be no different.
It was suggested by the conspiracy theorists that the venue had been arranged by the landlords to make it difficult for people to attend but Councillor Morrisson confirmed that due to the number of respondents no local venue was available. She would have preferred to use th Town Hall offices in Catford as they would have been at no cost but it was felt that the hall would be much more convenient to local people. As predicted, from a total of 87 registered objectors there were at my best estimate fifteen people at the meeting who were against and about ten in favour.
The gentleman from Wilmotts finally pointed out that he had seen significant improvements following the high level of investment made by themselves, Jelly Bean, the florist and others who had taken occupation since these properties had started to find their way to the market and expected this to continue.
I hope that anybody who was in attendance that finds any inaccuracies in my personal summary will take the time to point them out.
With best wishes.