The Sainsbury’s Meols Cop megastore opens tomorrow morning after ten years of controversies.
Set to welcome thousands of shoppers and create hundreds of new jobs, the huge superstore on the Meols Cop retail park had been a contentious subject for politicians and locals since plans were first revealed in 2015.
Council chiefs told the Liverpool Echo they were first made aware of the supermarket giants plans to abandon Lord Street and build a megastore out of town ten years ago in 2014.
What followed was a decade of controversy which ended in the High Court and an unusual restriction that could see the Meols Cop store close down overnight if it violated the rules
Cllr Daren Veidman, Sefton Council’s Cabinet Member for Planning said: “To say this development has been a challenge would be an understatement and a disservice to our incredibly hard working Planning officers.
“When factoring in pre-application guidance this has been a decade long process for our communities, the applicant and ourselves.
“With any planning application, regardless of size, Sefton’s Planning service is there to act as an impartial and fair body that weighs up both the positive and negative impacts of any development to ensure the borough is growing and our communities are well looked after.
“After careful consideration and investigations we recommended the initial application for the Meols Cop site be approved.”
However Council Planning officers added a caveat to the approval of the application stating that the smaller Lord Street store must stay open for a minimum of five years.
If supermarket bosses shut it down before that date then they are legally not allowed to trade from Meols Cop
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