I, AS many others who were at the district council's planning meeting of October 11 2011, welcomed the planning committee's stance on the appearance of the proposed Tesco store. After the sorry debacle of the Main Square (Enterprise centre) building, dumped on Coleford by the county council, it was good to see some common sense and concern to the pressures from large developers.

I happened to note that a presentation of a re-design was being shown to Coleford Town Council last Tuesday, (10th) and called in. I witnessed Tesco's design consultant produce a couple of A4 pages of text with tiny thumbnail views of what they were describing as an adequate redesign. After the presentation I queried some points with her to learn some very disturbing facts.

We now have this 'rehash' design possibly coming back to planning for approval at the February 14 planning meeting so here are my remarks.

1: An organisation such as Tesco should not be relying on scraps of paper with design views which can hardly be seen and asking for comments and approval when computers can easily produce A3 size overviews.

2: I understand from the comments of the planning committee that a design in keeping with rural market town appearance was required yet the pictures that I saw were still of a modern flat roofed slab like buildings, little changed, if any, from the original. A sketch of a feature meant to echo the Clock Tower in the Market Square was complete rubbish.

3: Most worrying was the statement that they had been in close discussions with the planners and case officer and had been given complete backing for this new proposal.

4: I ventured that the views of the local residents were of great importance with a town centre building such as this and it would have been good to see photographic examples of various other Tesco store designs to be able to choose from before finalising their proposals layout. I was told that a couple of public consultations had taken place in the town last year and the public had given their approval for the original design anyway.

5: I find it hard to believe that the people of Coleford want a slablike building in the middle of Coleford, dominating The Marshes and Railway Drive areas as well as the Old Station Way bypass. I cannot imagine that tourists will boast their memories of Coleford as a lovely unspoilt country town with these quaint, olde-worlde Co-op and Tesco buildings in the background of their photographs.

6: We are not a modern town or city and we do not want modern architecture which stands out (as the county council wanted for the Main Place). Tourists may take pictures of the Railway Museum but they won't be taking them of the Main Place next to it. Tourists would not visit Broadway on the Cotswolds to see a modern slab of a building in the middle of it so why should we have that here? We don't want the mishmash of architecture which occurred in the 60s or the Co-op 'slug' to be repeated.

7: I realise that the planning committee will not want to refuse this a second time and so there will be pressure to accept anything which is put in front of them. Therefore, if something is going to be done it needs to be done quickly. This is so important for Coleford's and the district's future so I implore all who read this to contact their local councillor, and/or the Coleford Town Council and/or the Planning Department quoting P1075/IP/FUL, and make their feelings known.

– Walt Williams, The Links, Coleford.