Plans for new retail outlets would hit Newport’s “fragile” economic health and threaten its standing as a market town, a report has claimed.

Telford & Wrekin Council planning chiefs are being recommended to refuse plans both for Mere Park in Stafford Road and the Audley Avenue Retail Park.

Members of the council’s plans board will hear next Wednesday that Growing Enterprises wants to build a 1,556sq metre unit at Mere Park, on land fronting Newport bypass.

The company is also applying for permission to remove a condition restricting the goods which could be sold from a new unit yet to be built on land at Mere Park.

Permission was granted last August for the planned new unit to sell only garden centre or farm shop-type products but the company wants to widen the range of goods on sale, to include items such as clothing, footwear, books, jewellery, household goods and hardware.

Discount

Growing Enterprises says it wants to build the unit for a “discount retail food store”.

The other application, by David Tringham, is for permission to sell food and associated non-food goods from one of two new retail units yet to be built.

The plans board last August only granted permission for the sale of “bulky comparison goods”, including such things as DIY products, gardening items, office furniture, pet foods, furniture and motor and cycle goods.

A 22-page report on the Mere Park plans, which will be considered by next week’s plans board, says: “In the context of the fragile health of Newport town centre, and the role that high street retailing plays there, significant adverse impacts on the centre have been identified.”

The impacts include the effects the plan would have on retail “vitality, viability and diversity” and the risk of harm to the town centre’s heritage.

A 23-page report on the Audley Avenue plans also highlights the fragile state of Newport’s economic health, and adds: “The ammendment to accommodate food retailing is not acceptable.”

Both reports conclude: “The proposed development would have a significant adverse impact on Newport town centre and threaten its role as a market town and undermine its position in the retail hierarchy of the borough.”

The reports say that the proposed developments are capable of being accommodated on sequentially preferable sites and the proposals are contrary to planning guidelines. Both reports add: “There are insufficient material considerations in favour of the proposal to overcome the identified significant adverse impacts and breaches of development plan policy.”