Woodwares closing / Sainsburys coming to Portobello

[lg1726]

Do we know how many letters of support v letters of objection were received?

As I understand it there were, apart from the submissions from the official reps, 13 statements of objections from local residents, one from the traders groups, one from a non-resident and 12 statements of support! This, I was told was unprecedented, and can only be attributed to the on-line portal set up by Geoff, meaning that more people took the opportunity presented by his tools, and so it was a pretty balanced position!

[gillian]

lg1726. Well done. If the shop you spoke about is the one I think it maybe (based on the man on the phone) Then beware, look back on TPor maybe one of the fb pages to find out about the mice situation. you may not want to shop there anyway.

[lg1726]

not sure if it the same shop, but I had planned not to go back again. Never mind, we will soon have Sainbury's to go to - no mice and no under age sales either!

[Makaveli]

Nice work LG.

[seashell]

Judging from the responses to the Evening News article, Portobello's very own self-appointed spokeswoman is not highly regarded by the very folk she purports to represent. Perhaps this should give her pause for thought before the next knee-jerk reaction?

Thank heavens you were there, lg, to inject a note of sanity and reasoned thought into the process.

[lg1726]

Judging from the responses to the Evening News article, Portobello's very own self-appointed spokeswoman is not highly regarded by the very folk she purports to represent. Perhaps this should give her pause for thought before the next knee-jerk reaction?

Thank heavens you were there, lg, to inject a note of sanity and reasoned thought into the process.

Well I think she was a bit perturbed at my being there and although I had to leave straight after that slot, she was giving me some pretty dirty looks, which may not have been missed by those on the board. I said to the board that I used to be a nurse on a liver unit and have seen first hand the devastating effect of alcohol and that I currently volunteer in a capacity which reminds me of the effect of harmful drinking on the person and their families and was not there to support the sale and consumption of alcohol, only the responsible sale of it! I said that I would happily see six Sainsburys on our High Street if that would help to tackle the problem! Not sure if it was sane and reasoned, but I am glad if it made a difference.

[Franck]

The main reason for objection is over-provision of people selling the peeve...is there a direct correlation to the number of peeve outlets to the amount of peeve purchased/consumed, or is said peeve purchases diluted thru the afore mentioned peeve emporiums?

Either way, good result for those of us who enjoy choice and variation of outlets for purchasing the peeve.

[seashell]

It must have been refreshing for them to have someone from Porty speaking from a position of knowledge and experience, lg.

Franck - do we now need a pet peeve shop to cater for the peeved?

[Bob Jefferson]

A reminder of Geoff's Ask Porty consultation on this:

From 62 responses

Full results here:

http://www.askporty.co.uk/SainsburysLoc ... tsurv.html

[SoupDragon]

I'm trying to understand this

Green Leith councillor Chas Booth said he was disappointed at the Portobello decision because there were already 20 licensed premises in the High Street.

where?

Forresters Arms
Galleon
3 Monkeys
Beaten Docket
Portobello Bar
Skylark


McColls
Fine Wine
?Victor Hugo
Scotmid
Costcutter
Kost Koncious
? Polish Deli
Joppa Stores

Malvarosa
St Andrews
Bonoful
Chinese restaurant at Joppa

The Masons Lodge

That list includes restaurants and pubs unless we go right along to Joppa and include Seahaven and Ormelie
or down to the Prom and include Espy, Dalriada
Or have I missed some?

I recent times we have lost - Viccy wines, Haddows, Pop Inn, Royal Hotel, First and Last, Tides Inn, Marine Bar/Grannies Attic. ( or even further back and include Hamilton Lodge, Sands, Proms, Seabeach, Railwaymans club...)


An interesting note- Craigmillar and Niddrie have no pubs but have a higher incidence of alcohol related hospital admissions.

[Sceptic]

Did anyone really believe that Sainsburys would be denied their licence for off sales alcohol? Sainsburys seem to quite willing to ammend their frontage design to accomodate any planning concerns. Could it be that this might be PAVED(Portobello Agaist Virtually Every Development)@s last hurragh? Unfortunately it will not, there will always be something they will be campaigning against. The biggest gripe I have is that they pretend that it is in OUR name that they do it.

[Puerto bella]

The sceptic in me feels that it is all engineered in order to get us all to support en masse a large supermarket app on Bailliefield site when Sainsbury double the council's offer and we've all played our parts marvellously.

[Franck]

Franck - do we now need a pet peeve shop to cater for the peeved?

It would have to be a mighty muckle shop to accomodate everyone's pet peeve's, which would alomost certainly raise objections....PAPS

[Franck]

The sceptic in me feels that it is all engineered in order to get us all to support en masse a large supermarket app on Bailliefield site when Sainsbury double the council's offer and we've all played our parts marvellously.

Not everyone was against the original application...

[lg1726]

The sceptic in me feels that it is all engineered in order to get us all to support en masse a large supermarket app on Bailliefield site when Sainsbury double the council's offer and we've all played our parts marvellously.

Not everyone was against the original application...

We have moved on a bit since the original application and we now have a more engaged community, in the most thanks to Geoff's on-line survey tools, which would assist in gaining the wider views of the community on such an application. As you say Franck, not everyone was opposed, and now we have the means of capturing the wider views and with more motived community members, we can present these views, divergent and/or cohesive!

[wangi]

I'm trying to understand this

Green Leith councillor Chas Booth said he was disappointed at the Portobello decision because there were already 20 licensed premises in the High Street.

where?

I think I linked to this earlier in the thread, an FOI response in June 2012 release the currently licenced premises in Edinburgh at that time; see http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/l ... premises_3

Filtered for Portobello High St:

[lg1726]

This was the basis for a previous discussion that they had earlier in the day; the need for more robust data around the types of licensed premises in an area, ie on and off sales etc. Also, as has been pointed out in a previous post, the data in relation to hospital admissions covers Portobello and Craigmillar, and there is a a very significant difference in hospital admission rates between these two parts of the ward which is at odds with this assumption of a correlation between number of licensed premises and the direct link to health stats. The board had acknowledged earlier in the day that this was an issue for them in terms of how robust their current policy is in relation to the issue of over provision

[Porty]

We have moved on a bit since the original application and we now have a more engaged community, in the most thanks to Geoff's on-line survey tools, which would assist in gaining the wider views of the community on such an application. As you say Franck, not everyone was opposed, and now we have the means of capturing the wider views and with more motived community members, we can present these views, divergent and/or cohesive!

Absolutely. There is no doubt that a significant majority, of those who expressed a view, were against the Superstore and so were the planners/council. Something that is conveniently overlooked by the core who detest all things council.

it could be quite different, next time around. There's been a change in quite a lot of circumstances and we now have some means of consulting,

[SoupDragon]

Thank Wangi, still under 20 and one restaurant listed twice
It's interesting to note not all the pubs do off sales.



I stand corrected , there is one pub in Craigmillar on Peffer Place.


I'm one of those who wasn't against a superstore. At present we drive to either Asda or Tesco for the messages
But we still use Findlays for meat: Earthy for some bread,fruit and veg; Cove for soap; use High St banks; buy some fruit and veg in the High St; use the bakers: Mr Soupy buys beer from one of the shops etc etc

[Makaveli]

I think Portobello missed a trick with that development that was proposed at Baileyfield - and look now there is a 'local' sized supermarket slap bang in the middle of the High Street!!! I am sure the 'Waitrose' sized store that was proposed in the Baileyfield site would have been not much bigger than the new Sainsbury Local will be.

I bet a few business's now wish that the new shop was going to be built on Baileyfield instead of right under their noses!!!!

[gillian]

Absolutely agree Makaveli, and we would have an arts centre and more housing thus more people using the lovely new shops on the high street. Who did say no to all that?. Come back BL try again. Build it on Baileyfield!!!

[Makaveli]

Build it on Baileyfield - that's quite catchy Rosa you should start a Facebo.......oh wait a minute

[seanie]

Absolutely agree Makaveli, and we would have an arts centre and more housing thus more people using the lovely new shops on the high street. Who did say no to all that?. Come back BL try again. Build it on Baileyfield!!!

There were 60 objections which, given the scale of the development, wasn't that many, but there was quite strong opposition from some members of the Community Council and various related organisations.

[gillian]

Absolutely agree Makaveli, and we would have an arts centre and more housing thus more people using the lovely new shops on the high street. Who did say no to all that?. Come back BL try again. Build it on Baileyfield!!!

There were 60 objections which, given the scale of the development, wasn't that many, but there was quite strong opposition from some members of the Community Council and various related organisations.

Of course there were!

[Makaveli]

Maybe Philip Myerscough is reading all this and thinking about coming back in now with a revised/similair plan to what was proposed before?

Anyone know where BL are at at the moment with this project?

[seanie]

The original application was recommended for approval but rejected by the planning committee on the basis of density and heights. BL started the process of a revised application addressing those issues by taking the top storey of the entire development. To make it stack up financially a 'Waitrose' type store was proposed, a wee bit larger than Scotmid. But BL were only willing to go to the expense and trouble of a full planning application if they could get the OK from the Community Council, since much of the opposition the first time round came from that quarter. The Community Council found themselves unable to come to a position and the issue went dead. From memory BL weren't the owners of the site, just managing the development, so presumably the financiers want out hence the site going on sale.

[lg1726]

Absolutely agree Makaveli, and we would have an arts centre and more housing thus more people using the lovely new shops on the high street. Who did say no to all that?. Come back BL try again. Build it on Baileyfield!!!

There were 60 objections which, given the scale of the development, wasn't that many, but there was quite strong opposition from some members of the Community Council and various related organisations.

The current planning application by Sainsbury's, before the planning committee on 5 December, has 62 letters of objection. Although it looks like a couple of them have been wrongly filed, as they clearly state their support for the application, but seem to have been put in the wrong pile! I think there are 25 or so in the support pile. Given the scale of the previous campaign, it's hard to believe that there is little difference in the actual numbers!

admin: posts split to Portobello Community Council.

[Sceptic]

62 letters? From how many souces? There were reports of a mass of objections from just a few people. The self appointed guardians of taste?

[lg1726]

62 letters? From how many souces? There were reports of a mass of objections from just a few people. The self appointed guardians of taste?

https://citydev-portal.edinburgh.gov.uk ... TH5EWLO000

I just checked the portal - link provided and there are now 44 letters of objection and 27 of support. I suspect they have tidied up the duplicates and those in the wrong pile and this, on a brief glance, looks more like it. As I understand it, Sainbury's have made some amendments in discussions with planning officials, but it will be decided on Wednesday.

[Makaveli]

I just sat and read through the objections and they are all pretty much the same - it looks very much like alot of people have been told what to write and just copied it verbatim!!!

And the comments about not needing another ATM really get on my wick - there is no ATM on that side of the road from the lights at the main junction to Joppa - I couldn't tell you the number of times I have had to walk back because I have no cash!!!

[seashell]

Am I missing something? What possible reason is there to complain about an ATM?

[lg1726]

I noticed that they had a revised plan up on the portal, but it's not possible to view now, I guess because the consultation period is now over. As you say, a lot of repetition, and all very much in line with the flyer that we all saw in the local shops and referred to in previous posts. We also saw here previously a copy of a DC email which seemed to be the source of that flyer, so no prizes for guessing who might have been leading the charge of objectors! That seems to be the start of the ATM issue, but as far as I'm aware, an ATM in itself is not a planning consideration, the building adaptations are. So whether we have one or not is not the issue!

It's good to see the high level of support for this, and great to see an "alternative" position getting put forward!

[Makaveli]

Most comments seemd to be 'we don't need another ATM' but with no real explaination why!!!

As you say Seashell what possible reason can there be to object to a built in ATM on a shop front on a street with not one single ATM on that side of the street. Seem to me to be a case of putting something on a letter of objection because they are struggling to come up with real good reasons to object.

It's not as if they are coming in and destroying the existing buildings and putting in a 24 hour hypermarket!!!

Object object object - I am getting sick to back teeth of the objections!!!!!

[fresian]

Noticed one of the 44 objections is actually Stephen McIntyre's letter of support. A number of the others are worded in exactly the same way, so have obviously come from the same source, but with their friends putting their names to them. There are a few others, and taking account of the, dare I say "ethnic" nature of their names, would suggest that they may be traders who are more concerned about loss of trade than loss of Georgian shopfront. It would certainly appear that If Sainsburys agree to use the heritage style, then many of the objections can be discharged.

[lg1726]

I had spotted a couple of others in the wrong pile which would appear to have now been correctly filed, and can only assume that they are currently "tidying up" the documents. I think it looks like a lot of those letters, both for and against, have been generated via Geoff's link and so the wording looks similar. No doubt just as those of us in support used it to record that, so too might those against, who may not previously have objected used it as well - but hey, that's democracy. I have no problem with whatever style Sainbury's end up having to use, and yes the heritage one would appease many, but it does seem very hypocritical to object to this. Given the look of many of the existing shops, seems a tad inconsistent and perhaps, hard to justify!