Ashington Asda store 'blights' lives of locals
People living near the site of a new supermarket in Ashington say building work is wrecking their lives.
The residents of North View are furious at the size of the £25m Asda store which is being built at the bottom of their gardens.
North View residents (from left) Joan Hydes, Kim Kidd, Bill Kidd and Eunice Mackenzie
The multi-million pound building is going up on the site of Ashington FC's former home Portland Park. But people living in the area say it towers over their homes, blighting their view and they are fed up with the building work.
Joan Hydes, who has lived in North View for 31 years, said: "The building is a monstrosity. It's very imposing. We didn't realise it was going to be quite as big.
"It's absolutely huge. It's right on top of us and they swing the girders over our gardens with the cranes so our children can't play outside.
"They were supposed to put up an acoustic fence but that hasn't happened. We're all very stressed. It will hit the value of our houses."
Her 76-year-old neighbour, who has lived on the street for 50 years, said: "My house vibrated when they dug the foundations. It's been horrendous for the past two months with dust and dirt everywhere.
"They're putting up the steel girders and its getting bigger and bigger. Whenever we try to get in touch with Asda we never hear anything back."
An Asda spokesman said the store, which will create 150 jobs, is in line with planning consent.
He said: "We will shortly be constructing an acoustic fence which will shield residents on North View. We will be writing to residents over the coming weeks to keep them informed on the next stages of the development.
"The store, which will open in October, will generate significant new employment opportunities for local people.
"We will be working closely with Jobcentre Plus to target local job seekers, providing a boost for the local economy."
We'd like to hear from you. Send your stories, pics and videos
Older/Newer
« Northumberland fire service dog retires | Picture gallery: Northumberland Flickr group »
3 Comments
Leave a comment
We want to publish your blog on one of our community websites. Find out more.
Keep up to date subscribe to our RSS feed
Living or working in Ashington? We'd like to hear from you. Send your stories, pics and videos
Journal Extra, Northumberland's free weekly, is inside copies of The Journal across the county every Thursday, and can also be picked up from these locations around Ashington »
Having grown up in North View the current residents have my sincere sympathy. The construction shown in your picture has to be one of the most intrusive invasion of privacy that you could imagine. How did the planning department of Wansbeck Council justify approval of such a monstrosity so close to residential proprty !!! The ASDA response is a typical "corporate" answer without comapasion or feeling - erecting an acoustic wall? How HIGH and why so LATE in the construction process. Lets hope that this corporate giant has the courtesy to offer compensation to the residents for the short term distribution and more importantly the permanent impact that this will have
John Nichol
Thank you for your comments Mr Nichol,very well said.The questions you raised are some of the ones we want answers to.
As for the "acoustic" wall, we recieved one letter from BAM (a member of the Considerate Constructors), in February,stating that one of the first "activities" was to be the "construction of a permanent acoustic fence to the
North View properties to reduce the impact of construction works".As I said,
THIS WAS IN FEBRUARY !!.It has yet to be built,
although since the story appeared in the newspapers, we did recieve one letter from an Asda representative,"Concerning the construction of the new Asda store to the REAR of your properties",only one problem with this,IT'S AT THE FRONT OF OUR HOMES !!! (Big planning error I think, Asda have always stated that the store is at the bottom of our rear gardens).They go on to say that they are ready to build the fence" as soon as possible,to provide screening from disturbance during construction..."a bit late perhaps ?
Thanks again for Your support,we are looking into ways in which we can get some justice.
Mr W Kidd
North View (This means our Homes face North,are you listening Asda?}
Surely the fault here lies with the Local Authority for consenting the development in the first place?