Lidl Eyre Street: Sheffield Supermarket scheme faces objections over hidden river controversy
Supermarket chain Lidl has upset environmentalists over plans to develop a Sheffield city centre store above a hidden river.
The chain has put in a planning application with Sheffield Council which would see the company convert the former Staples and Mothercare stores on Eyre Street, just off the bottom of the Moor, into a supermarket.
But now both the Environment Agency and the Sheaf and Porter Rivers Trust have raised concerns over the scheme – which they say fails to take into account the needs of the River Porter, which runs underground in that part of the city, through man-made tunnels known as culverts.
Sheaf and Porter Rivers Trust spokesman Simon Ogden said: “Whilst the trust does not object to the supermarket as such we are very surprised and disappointed that the plans submitted conceal the fact that the Porter Brook runs under and through their site and offer none of the improvements required by Council planning policy.
"A supporting ecological survey accompanying the application by professional ecologists Tyler Grange somehow manages to ignore the river under their noses and states ‘there are no waterways present on or adjacent to site, and all waterways in the surrounding area are separated by significant physical barriers including roads, rail lines and motorways’.
"The Trust sees this application as an important test case in Sheffield City Council’s commitment to implementing the policy and of Lidl’s declared environmental responsibility.”
He said the trust wants Lidl to acknowledge and include the exposed Porter within their site boundary and include proposals for its restoration. They also want it to uncover the hidden Porter where it runs under the car park, and put in place signs identifying the Porter Brook and the Porter Brook Trail within their site.
He added that a public petition raising the concerns was launched at Saturday’s Sharrow Festival and had already collected a large number of names.
Meanwhile, in a letter to Sheffield Council, Bev Lambert, sustainable places officer at the Environment Agency said that the scheme would only be acceptable if a planning condition requiring a landscape planning scheme, which includes detail on how the river habitat will be improved, was included.
They also raised concerns over the lack of reference to the Porter Brook in the Preliminary Ecological Appraisal, despite it flowing through the proposed site.
The Environment Agency says it has worked for several years with partners, including Sheffield City Council, on improving the Porter in the city centre to restore and enhance the river, to prevent deterioration and promote recovery of the River Porter. This section of the river has been heavily modified through urbanisation and flood management actions creating physical conditions including hard banks, culverts, and weirs
The site is only about 100m downstream from the site where a section of the culvert – the concrete above the river – collapsed at the Decathlon shop site, where an agreement has been reached to retain an open section of river, improving biodiversity.
Lidl has been approached for comment on the concerns.