Following a presentation given by Mendip District Council's Malcolm Williams, Civic Society members voted overwhelmingly to reject the current proposals, and to call for a more limited, sensitive development.  This is exactly what Save Wells stands for, and we welcome their decision. Their full press release follows:...

Wells Civic Society’s members demand new plans for Princes Road area.

Whilst a packed meeting of Wells Civic Society’s members overwhelmingly rejected Centros Miller’s current proposals for redeveloping the Princes Road area, there was an equal level of support for sympathetic regeneration of the area.

 A record turnout of 97 members (over 40% of the membership) attended a meeting to hear Malcolm Williams (Mendip District Council’s Director of Community & Regeneration) explain the council’s three separate functions in relation to the development site: as a land owner, as the planning authority and as the facilitator of economic regeneration.  The presentation made it clear that at this stage, the Council was only involved in its capacity as the regeneration facilitator.

Following a full and lively discussion, the Society’s members were asked to vote on key points.

• When asked whether they supported Centros Miller’s current proposal, 92 members voted against and only 1 in favour.
• No-one voted in favour of Tesco being allowed to expand its retail sales area beyond that for which it already has planning consent and 94 members voted against.

• There was widespread concern about the increase in total retail space and the number of new units envisaged in the proposal – whilst nine members supported this scale of development, 82 members did not. <!--[endif]-->
•  Following a debate on the need to maintain an east-west access route between Priory Road and Tucker Street, 89 members voted in favour of maintaining such a route and one voted against.<!--[endif]-->
• In a final vote, members were asked whether, in principle, they would support a regeneration scheme if it was revised to reflect the Society’s views, expressed by the previous ballots.  There was overwhelming support, with 84 members voting in favour and six against.<!--[endif]-->

Following the meeting Wells Civic Society’s Chairman, Roger Cookman said “I was delighted by the excellent attendance and the positive participation and response from our members.  We now have a clear mandate from our members to demand a sympathetic regeneration proposal that is in scale and keeping with the rest of the historic City of Wells.  I encourage all members of Wells Civic Society to contact their Mendip Council representatives with their views and suggestions for improvement, to help inform the Council’s decision making process.”

- Ends -

Notes to editors:

Wells Civic Society was founded in 1951 with the aims of:

•  Stimulating public interest in, and care for, the beauty, history and character of the City
•  Encouraging high standards of architecture and town planning consistent with good civic design and in the context of the neighbouring townscape.
• Encouraging the preservation, development and improvement of features of general public amenity or historic interest.It currently has 233 members.

Any questions should be directed in the first instance to the Society’s Secretary, Kim Robinson via This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it   or 01749 677596.