IT IS increasingly obvious that as the Waitrose saga rambles on Okehampton is becoming more and more out of sympathy with the daunting prospects ahead.
It is equally apparent, analysing earlier correspondence, that those supporting Waitrose were not swayed by statistics and common sense but by deference to a name. Not a single thought had been given as to the site's suitability or otherwise for two close warring factions or the consequences to summer visitors and drivers generally from traffic control chaos and sub-standard parking arrangements that will turn Market Street and Mill Road car park into a motorist's nightmare. Hardly the stuff to restore a town's sagging economy. If this induces people to shop elsewhere, blame you-know-who.
Instead, we are left with planners in Exeter and Tavistock, insensitive to Okehampton's character and needs, and blinkered to our future. One can only fear the plans for Kempley Road, St James' Street and George Street, including West Devon's own monstrous eyesore for St James' Chapel, if these are carried out with the same limited vision.
More worrying still is the town's expansion to come, a subtopia of 800 new houses by 2001 and a further 1800 by 2011. One wonders what thought has been given to this sort of population that one day will descend on the town centre like a ton of bricks. The only place for Waitrose was on the Exeter Road industrial estate where all multiple stores should go. Pedestrians would be served by fleets of buses based on regular timetables. This is the area where Okehampton is planned to develop and has developed and it was a criminal waste of land and public facilities to put the project anywhere else. How a feasibility study approved it I'll never know.
Jack Hellier
Castle Road
Okehampton