Traders fear parking loss

TRADERS in Uckfield have expressed fears that the town could be without a central car park for up to a year while work to redevelop the Tesco superstore is carried out.

Members of the chamber of commerce last week said that disruption caused by any future work to rebuild the town centre superstore could have a 'terminal' effect on Uckfield businesses.

The comments came after a private meeting, on Thursday last week, between a sub-committee of the chamber and the senior developer working on behalf of Tesco.

Chris Lawson, of Lawson Commercial, relayed details of a meeting with Mr Christopher Borkowski to chamber members on Thursday night. He revealed that Tesco planned to double the size of their store and increase the number of car parking spaces available.

He said that early Tesco plans were to demolish their existing store and build a new one into the hill at Luxford Field and Luxford car park.

This new store would be be about 85,000 square feet, compared to the current store's total of 45,000 square feet. Plans had also been drawn up for 900 car parking spaces on two levels, compared to the current figure of around 700 spaces in Luxford and Tesco car park.

However, in order to move the store up the hill, the first development work would have to mean the digging up of Luxford car park, leaving Tesco's car park as the only major parking zone in that area of town.

'The town could go nine months to a year with no central car park,' said Mr Lawson. 'That's not really on. We could not have a situation where there was no car park in the town.

'We have to have some replacement car parking spaces somewhere. But even then, the disruption caused by big diggers in the middle of town may well put some people off coming into the town. One has to ask whether they would return after the work has been finished.'

Senior political and business figures in the town expressed their concern at the news. Mayor Barrie Murray said: 'Will anyone be able to get up the High Street while building work is going on? People won't be able to get from one side of town to the other,' while county councillor Christopher Dowling said: 'Twelve months of disruption could turn Uckfield into a ghost town.'

Trifast's Malcolm Diamond added: 'Disruption for a year could be terminal, but it's not an option to do nothing either. We've got to be radical, but radical is full of risk.'

Traders also expressed concern at the lack of entrances into the car park. Only one exit at Bell Lane roundabout was proposed by Mr Borkowski. A pedestrian access was proposed at the existing Civic Approach entrance. However, traders thought that that access should be for cars also.