The Queen is to visit the new Welshpool Livestock Market at Buttington shortly. The new livestock market appears to be working smoothly and does not cause any traffic issues. But what a shame the planners have not insisted on effective landscaping. The building design is very minimalistic to be generous but the dearth of landscaping is shameful. The surface car park is elevated above the Trunk road with the badly treated hedgerow offering very little if any screening. The car park is also hard up against the hedgeline making it impossible to plant trees along this boundary. The recent footway installation has also taken its toll on the hedge while Powys Highways have recently installed a massive roadsign, breaking through the hedge with supporting stanchions leaving a 5 metre gap in the hedge. It is a pity that Powys decided to make the Council's Landscape Architect redundant as the former postholder would never have supported the Livestock Market application in the form that its has been implemented. I fear that developers more widely can now build without bothering about the issue of landscape impact as there is no one at the County Council who can offer professional guidance in this area.
Good job it is not Prince Charles with his deep interest in design and aesthetics who is the one visiting the new Livestock Market!
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This is a minor point given that Welshpool now has a new livestock market that is easy to access and is convenient to the highway network and markets.
ReplyDeleteI very much agree with your blog here. I feel it is a pity that more has not been done to improve on landscaping. The industrial estate opposite did a better job!! Why was this not conditioned?! When I saw the developers ripping up the old hedgerows, I had no idea that these might not have been replaced - at least to some extent anyway. As you enter onto the bypass from the Oswestry road; you could initially be tricked into thinking this was a large car park - a park&ride parking area perhaps - and is a very harsh first view. Although I do quite like the main building itself; the whole site could have been made to look a great deal better by proper landscaping. As for that silly little brick house which looks like it has been plonked on top of the curb....I won't even go there!
ReplyDeleteAnon - I agree that the Livestock Market will contribute to economic development and accept your personal views that there are clear benefits to having such a facility in Mid Wales.
ReplyDeleteAnon - Hooray, someone else agrees that the site is barren and open. You mention the Buttington Cross industrial estate opposite - but also the Offa's Dyke Business Park along Leighton Road dating from a similar period when Powys employed a Landscape Architect. We now see further evidence of lack of landscaping next to Buttington Church. This is an extension to Offa's Dyke Business Park but without the careful landscaping of the first phase. Why didn't the access be taken from the first phase which would have avoided the wholsale destruction of a large length of historic hedgerow that would have helped screen the future factory buildings? As for the house - yes what a pitiful design at such a prominent location. Instead of a brick box why didn't the planners insist on a more sustainable low carbon modern building that could have demonstrated energy efficiency? Not sure either the purpose for a house at this location.