I WAS appalled to learn (Daily Echo, February 20) that North Dorset District Council has agreed to to allow a major supermarket outside of Blandford to increase its floor space by 73 per cent.
I am well aware that retailing habits have significantly changed over the past 50 years and that large supermarkets offer value for money, but is is surely a matter of balance.
The council's planning officer himself estimates that the development could draw up to £1.3million of business away from the town centre and that two stores in the town (Iceland and the Co-op), both within walking distance for local residents, were at risk.
This is a problem which has beset many Dorset towns but Blandford has, in my view, unique Georgian features, and a development of this kind runs the very real risk of turning the town into a ghost town increasingly thrown over to charity shops Is that what the council is prepared to see happen?
GORDON CANN Craigmoor Avenue, Bournemouth
