Plans For Second Aldi Supermarket in Wrexham Recommended For Approval

Plans to create a second Aldi supermarket in Wrexham could be given the green light by councillors next week. 

In an application due to go before Wrexham’s Planning Committee on Monday afternoon it has been recommended that proposals to build an Aldi supermarket on Ruthin Road are approved.

Back in July Wrexham.com reported that plans had been submitted to develop the supermarket which could create an estimated 50 jobs, including roles for 25 part time staff and 25 full time staff.

At present there is only one Aldi store in Wrexham, which is located on Plas Coch Retail Park. However across the country the company, which launched its first UK store in 1990, now operates over 500 stores and 7000 across Europe, North America and Australia.

If approved the supermarket will be built on the ambulance depot site on Ruthin Road, which is due to be demolished when work on the new station behind the Wrexham Maelor is complete.

Access to the site will be provided by the current entrance to the Morrison’s supermarket, however comments regarding potential traffic issues on Ruthin Road and Bradley Road have been raised by neighbouring residents. The comments include:

• Bradley Road would not be able to cope with backed up traffic as far as the Bradley Road/Watery Road junction which impinges on the residents’ life
• Application should be delayed until a full and valid impact on traffic on the Offa area and the
  new Fire and Ambulance Station
• Impact on traffic lights system at Morrison’s will cause more congestion.

However feedback from a Transport Assessment state: “There are peak hour traffic capacity issues at various locations in the vicinity of the site. Junction capacity assessments have been undertaken at these locations to establish the net impact of traffic generated by the proposed development.

“The assessments demonstrate that the proposed development would not have a material impact on the highway network. In short there is anticipated to be approximately 1 additional vehicle on the highway per minute in the peak hour; which is less than the 5% increase figure considered to be material by the Welsh Government.

“It is acknowledged that there is already significant queuing at the A525 / A483 interchange and at the Bradley Road, Victoria Road and Ruabon Road junctions. However it is considered that the additional vehicle every minute will result in an imperceptible increase in queue lengths.”

Within the initial application it was noted that the supermarket would not compete with local, existing businesses – however feedback from a neighbouring resident questions if the town needs another supermarket.

This particular issue is not discussed within the planning report, however with regards to competing with existing businesses details within the document state: ” An assessment of impact has also been undertaken given the site location, in an out of centre location.

“The assessment covers the impact on changing trading patterns in the Town Centre and any impact on the Town Centre is expected to be negligible.”

The application will be debated by Wrexham’s Planning Committee on Monday 7th December at 4pm. For those who can’t attend the meeting, it will be webcast live on the Wrexham Council website!