Turf war reignited between Waitrose and Sainsbury's (From Bucks Free Press)

Turf war reignited between Waitrose and Sainsbury's

10:30am Friday 20th March 2009 in News By James Nadal

TURF war between two supermarket giants has been reignited after Waitrose urged councillors to throw out Sainsbury's plans to build a store on its site and pledged it would fight to remain in Marlow.

Food chain Sainsbury's submitted an application in February to build a bigger store on the premises in West Street, having acquired the head lease on the site, which expires in December 2009, two years ago.

Although the company does not hold the site freehold, it is higher in the pecking order than Waitrose, and has the power to take control of the land.

Waitrose, part of the John Lewis partnership, has written to Wycombe District Council to object to the proposals for the 1600sq/m store and said it “remains committed to retaining a presence within the town centre.”

The retail company has been in the town for 35 years.

The letter from Chris Goddard, director for GVA Grimley Ltd, on behalf of Waitrose, states that it “continues to explore the potential for pursuing a two store strategy within the town centre and is continuing to develop options to remain in Marlow.”

A public consultation on the Sainsbury's plans was held last year and Marlow residents, councillors and community groups also published a development strategy for the area called the the Riley Road development brief.

However, Mr Goddard, said Waitrose is “concerned” about the brief which he said “has no statutory weight within the development control process” and “cannot legitimately be classified as a local development plan.”

Wycombe District Council spokesman Catherine Spalton said: “The Riley Road development brief has been prepared in support of the existing policy M4 of the Local Plan and is entirely consistent with this policy; the supporting text to policy M4 outlines that a development brief is needed for the site and the link to this policy is clearly stated in the brief.

“The development brief – which is not intended as a statutory planning document - has weight as a material consideration within the development control process, largely due to the degree of public consultation involved in its preparation.

“It will be formally approved by a Cabinet Member decision later this month.”

Mr Goddard said Waitrose is also opposed to the plan due to loss of car parking, traffic problems and because it “is likely to have significant transport impacts and is contrary to adopted local planning policies.”

However, Sainsbury's spokesman Kirsty Merrills said: “Traffic and highways issues have been addressed in the application and we are surprised that Waitrose have objected on traffic grounds.

“Our proposed site is significantly smaller than the one proposed by Waitrose in 2006 and will therefore have much less traffic impact."

"Sainsbury's proposals accord with the emerging development brief prepared by the District Council and local community.

She added: “Indeed, we delayed submission of our application until the draft brief was published to ensure the proposals did not prejudice the wider redevelopment of the site in the future.”

Derek Done from the Marlow Society, which is devoted to the preservation and development of Marlow, said: “We are broadly in favour of the design but there's a couple of questions we have about traffic and the parking is another issue.”

However, Mr Done said the society was “happy” with Sainsbury's approach because “they have listened to people.”

A decision could be made by councillors at the end of April, although no date has yet been finalised.

Work on the new store could begin early in 2010 if the district council gives the go ahead.