Firstly a Public Meeting was held at Hardy Hall in February of this year.
In order to have some basis for discussion, I created the following document from a mixture of known figures, logic and guesswork.
I wanted people to be able to have some idea of the possible size of the proposed store in comparison to stores they already knew.
Future catch up posts will show what they are now actually proposing and it is interesting to see how close or far away I was.
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TESCO PRE-APPLICATION DISCUSSION DOCUMENT
This document has been prepared as a basis for people to be informed of and discuss the relative pros and cons of what will almost certainly, in the near future, be an application for planning consent to build a Superstore on the land at Little Lever formerly occupied by Pennine Pets.
At present, there are no 100% certain facts or details of the proposal in the public domain, nor will there be until a formal application is made to Bolton Council for Planning Consent.
However it has been confirmed that confidential pre-application talks are taking place between representatives of the Developer and Officers of Bolton Council Planning Department.
Notwithstanding the ‘off the top of the head’ reactions of people to the idea of this development, both for and against, it is obvious that there will be major implications for and impacts on the ‘Village’ of Little Lever and its future.
No development of this nature and likely size comes with just ‘plusses’. There is always a mixture of ‘plusses’ and minuses’.
It is on the balance of these plusses and minuses that people should be able to make their own decision – for or against.
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Sources of Data.
Bolton Council Website, Land Registry.
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The purpose of this development.
It must be obvious that the prime motivation behind anything that the four or five major supermarket chains do is to increase their share of the market and thus increase the return to their shareholders.
There is nothing altruistic about their motives. They do nothing for the benefit of the community. It is simply about money – Your money - that they want in their tills and not their rivals.
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Catchment Areas
Convenience shopping has to be ‘convenient’ – no-one wants to be travelling 10 or 15 miles for the ‘big shop’
So, for the purposes of this document, we shall examine the provision of Supermarkets in the following areas –identified by postcode
BL3 ( 1 & 2 ) Little Lever and parts of Great Lever in the vicinity of Burnden – Zone 6 on the map.
BL4 Farnworth and Kearsley – Zone 8 on the map
M26 Radcliffe and Stoneclough. – Zone 7 on the map
The stores currently in this area are Asda Burnden, Asda Farnworth and Asda Radcliffe.
Also being built at the moment is Tesco Longcausway.
By their own admission, the purpose of the development at Longcausway is to break the near monopoly that Asda holds on the majority of convenience shopping in the Catchment Areas above.
The proposed development at Pennine Pets is the second phase of this strategy.
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What is known for certain.
The land at Pennine Pets is held leasehold by Linda Seddon and Alan Mark Seddon of Pelton Fold Farm Bury Road Edgewoth Bolton as trustees of the Pennine Pension Fund.
According to the Land Registry, the value of the land as at 18th February 2008 was stated to be under £100,000.
The area covered by the site is 1.381 hectares
This translates to 13,810 square metres or 148,649 square feet.
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The size of the store
It can reasonably be assumed that the developer will build the store to the maximum size that is commensurate with providing on site parking, onsite roads, delivery access, loading and warehousing etc.
By comparison with the Longcauseway development, which is 2.7 hectares, the Pennine Pets site is likely to have a development of 48.5% of the size of Longcausway in all respects.
The ground floor area of the whole building at Longcauseway is 6,508 sq metres. There will also be within this footprint a mezzanine area of 2,090 sq metres reached by escalators
By comparison therefore, the Pennine Pets ground floor area of the whole building is likely to be circa 3,156 sq metres.
Equally, Longcauseway will provide on site parking for 480 cars.
By comparison Pennine Pets will provide car parking on site for circa 238 cars.
This in fact may be reduced in view of the fact that the Pennine Pets site is bang in the middle of a residential area which Longcauseway isn’t and certain distances between features of the site and adjacent houses must be maintained. This also depends upon whether the store is located towards the centre of the site or towards one or other edges.
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The size of the proposed development in relation to existing stores we are familiar with.
The stores we are probably most familiar with are Asda - Burnden Park and Asda -Farnworth.
Both these stores sell what are described as Convenience Goods ( Food Cleaning materials etc and Comparison Goods ( Clothes, electrical etc)
I have only been able to find floorspace figures for Convenience goods.
The figures are
Asda Burnden – Net floorspace Convenience Goods only = 2,601 sq metres
Asda Farnworth - Net floorspace Convenience Goods only = 2,327 sq metres.
The following statement relates to Longcausway
“A food superstore of 8,460 sq m (gross internal area / 5,076 sq m (net) is the focus of the development.
The sales area is assumed to be 60% of the gross which is considered to be a typical net/gross ratio for modern large format foodstores.
The sales area comprises 2,792 sq m of convenience retail floor spaceand 2,284 sq m of comparison retail floorspace.
Convenience sales area is 55% of the total sales area, which is considered to be a typical convenience:comparison ration for modern large format foodstores.
The sales area includes all sales floorspace within the store.
The convenience turnover of the store will be in the order of £33.1m and the comparison turnover of some 17.3m”
Calculations from the above typical ratios give us the following.
Asda Burnden. Convenience goods 2,601 sq m (55%) therefore Comparison goods = 2,128 sq m (45%) gives total sales area = 4,729 sq m.
Total sales area 4,729 sq m is 60% of total footprint (no mezzanine) so total footprint = 7,881 sq m.
Asda Farnworth Convenience goods 2,327 sq m (55%) therefore Comparison goods = 1,903 sq m (45%) gives total sales area = 4,230 sq m
Total sales area 4,320 sq m is 60% of total footprint (no mezzanine) so total footprint = 7,501 sq m
The calculation of the footprint of the proposed Pennine Pets development (see above) is 3,156 sq metres.
So on the basis that there is no mezzanine floor, the store would be something short of half the size of Asda Farnworth.
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Opening Hours
A survey done in March 2008 by Roger Tym and Partners shows that 24.57% of the money spent on Convenience shopping by residents of BL3 1 and BL3 2 is spent at Asda Burnden.
A further 9.15% is spent at Asda Farnworth, a further 8.36% is spent at Sainsbury’s, Trinity St, a further 12.15% is spent at Asda Radcliffe and 2.16% is spent at Tesco Middlebrook.
The majority of the money spent at Asda Farnworth(63.64%)comes from residents of the BL4 postcode (ie Farnworth and Kearsley).
Tesco’s major target must therefore be firstly Asda Burnden and secondly Asda Radcliffe, in as much that the Longcauseway store is already targeting Asda Farnworth.
Of these, Asda Burnden is 24 hour opening.
It is not unreasonable therefore to assume that Tesco would wish the Pennine Pets development to be a 24 hour operation in order to have the maximum impact on Asda Burnden.
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Traffic Impact caused by the development.
All the goody-goody policies of the Government and Local Authorities have to pay lip service to the more environmentally friendly modes of transport such as Buses and Cycling.
Realistically, two trolley loads of food are going to be transported by car, even if you live only 300yards away.
The existing traffic to and from Tesco Metro on Market St is a testament to this as anybody who has tried to cross Foundary St will know.
The figures below relate to the number of vehicle movements in an out of the site. These figures must be added to the normal traffic movements through and in the vicinity of the Junction.
There is a industry standard database available on line which provides a means of calculating typical vehicle in and out movements from different kinds of developments on an hourly basis over a twenty four hour period.
The following figures are for a Food Superstore.
Applying the figures to a store of 3,156 gross sq metres gives the following results.
The discrepancies in the totals in and out are due to rounding up the calculations.
| Hour | In | Out | Total |
| 0.00-01.00 | 21 | 24 | 45 |
| 01.00-02.00 | 17 | 16 | 33 |
| 02.00-03.00 | 13 | 10 | 23 |
| 03.00-04.00 | 10 | 8 | 18 |
| 04.00-05.00 | 7 | 5 | 12 |
| 05.00-06.00 | 17 | 12 | 29 |
| 06.00-07.00 | 31 | 28 | 59 |
| 07.00-08.00 | 64 | 45 | 109 |
| 08.00-09.00 | 124 | 78 | 202 |
| 09.00-10.00 | 179 | 125 | 304 |
| 10.00-11.00 | 195 | 172 | 367 |
| 11.00-12.00 | 195 | 200 | 395 |
| 12.00-13.00 | 209 | 210 | 419 |
| 13.00-14.00 | 204 | 208 | 412 |
| 14.00-15.00 | 197 | 202 | 399 |
| 15.00-16.00 | 199 | 205 | 404 |
| 16.00-17.00 | 214 | 211 | 425 |
| 17.00--18.00 | 216 | 228 | 444 |
| 18.00-19.00 | 201 | 220 | 421 |
| 19.00-20.00 | 154 | 185 | 339 |
| 20.00-21.00 | 106 | 131 | 237 |
| 21.00-22.00 | 68 | 87 | 155 |
| 22.00-23.00 | 29 | 43 | 72 |
| 23.00-00.00 | 40 | 44 | 84 | Totals | 2,710 | 2,697 | 5,407 |
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This might seem excessive but the figures from the former Kwik Save at Longcauseway are as follows. The size of the Kwik Save Complex was 3,700 sq metres but was only open from 8am to 6pm
| Hour | In | Out | Total |
| 08.00-09.00 | 164 | 110 | 274 |
| 09.00-10.00 | 238 | 179 | 417 |
| 10.00-11.00 | 279 | 245 | 524 |
| 11.00-12.00 | 294 | 291 | 585 |
| 12.00-13.00 | 296 | 308 | 605 |
| 13.00-14.00 | 290 | 298 | 588 |
| 14.00-15.00 | 287 | 291 | 578 |
| 15.00-16.00 | 296 | 301 | 597 |
| 16.00-17.00 | 318 | 312 | 630 |
| 17.00--18.00 | 325 | 343 | 668 | Totals | 2,788 | 2,678 | 5,466 |
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Existing traffic at the Junction
These figures come from a traffic survey carried out to see the impact on the Junction of the Wainhomes development.
They only relate to the ‘Rush Hour’ AM/PM and are 2008 figures.
| Direction | AM | PM |
| Market left into Church | 634 | 477 |
| Market right into Ainsworth | 7 | 37 |
| Market straight on into Lever | 70 | 90 |
| Church right into Market | 359 | 644 |
| Church straight on into Ainsworth | 45 | 174 |
| Church left into Lever | 20 | 35 |
| Ainsworth straight on into Church | 131 | 51 |
| Ainsworth left into Market | 40 | 92 |
| Ainsworth right into Lever | 1 | 0 |
| Lever right into Church | 20 | 19 |
| Lever left into Ainsworth | 1 | 1 |
| Lever straight on into Market | 38 | 90 |
| Total traffic through the Junction | 1,366 | 1,710 |
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Access to site
It is not unreasonable to suggest that visitors to the site would follow the following routes.
1) From Moses Gate up Church St through the junction
2) From Radcliffe end down Market St through the Junction.
3) From Bradley Fold by way of Victory Rd
4) From Breightmet by means of Radcliffe Rd and Lever St/ Victory Rd
5) From Bradley fold end via Tong Rd/ Victory Rd etc
The question then arises as to where the access to the site might be located.
There are currently three entrances.
1) From Lever St via the former Samuel St.
This can be discounted since Wainhomes have the ‘ransom’ strips either side on lease and there is no way they’re gonna co-operate with this development.
2) From Victory Rd - next to the Take away.
This is probably too residential for the main customer access but might be considered for the delivery entrance.
3) From Ainsworth Rd in the vicinity of Crossley St.
This would seem to be favourite since approaches have been made to the owners of No 15 & 17 adjacent to Crossley St and some mention has been made of the Council making available the strip of land with the seven trees between Crossley St and the shop complex at the corner of Lever St/Ainsworth Rd.
However, this access, if at 90 degrees to Ainsworth Rd, would mean that coming out of the site and turning right would, within 50 ft, come up to the Junction.
This would mean that there would be a more or less permanent back up of vehicles from the junction back into the site.
Logic therefore suggests that the main customer access should be straight into a modified Junction.
The Junction - ‘Traffic Lights’ or ‘Roundabout’
Access straight into a modified junction with traffic lights could mean the acquisition and demolition of the shop complex on the corner of Lever St/Ainsworth Rd
Access into a modified junction with a Roundabout could mean the acquisition and demolition of the shop complex on the corner of Church St/Lever St, the shop complex on the corner of Lever St/Ainsworth Rd and the shop complex on the corner of Church St/Market St..
All of this may seem to be conjecture, but there has to be access somewhere, there will have to be a modification of the Junction to cope with the extra traffic somehow - and what other alternatives are there?
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A final point. – Visibility
If I were developing this kind of store, I would want it to be visible from the main roads surrounding it.
Without the drastic removal of the shop complex on the corner of Lever St/Ainsworth Rd, it would be all but invisible from Church St or Market St.
Removal of the other 6 houses on Ainsworth - 19,21,23,25,27,29 – and perhaps even those on Victory Rd would make it more visible, but not from the main routes.
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