Store plans suffers set back

Innovating Space wants to put a store - potentially a Morrisons - on Station Road, Cottingham, which would create 250 jobs and £10m worth of construction work. Planners at East Riding Council are recommending refusal of the plans, which have attracted hundreds of objections, at a meeting next Thursday.

A study by the council’s consultants England and Lyle claims a new store would be likely to have a “significant adverse impact on Cottingham district centre”, taking 39 per cent of trade from the village’s Co-op and 22 per cent from other shops. Coun Geraldine Mathieson said: “It doesn’t surprise me at all that this is down for refusal as the council’s consultants have said it will cause too much damage to the local economy.”

But Simon Dixon, from the developers, said: “Our argument is that if the population stopped having to go to Beverley, Willerby and Hull and shopped back in Cottingham, even for the 12 (traders) that have comparison goods, there would be more footfall and shopping traffic in Cottingham.”