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Have Wellington Way Shops met their Waterloo? Plans demolish part of Waterlooville Precinct

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The landlord of Wellington Way plans to knockdown and redevelop the Wellington Way shops. Business owners in Wellington Way are not being allowed to renew their leases into 2016.

Wellington Way Waterlooville Closing

The landlord wishes to redevelop Wellington Way to provide a mix commercial space and housing. One such design is available to view on the Ayre Chamerlain Gaunt (ACG) website. The design from ACG would give 2000m2 of retail space and 100+ new residential flats/houses.

Businesses at risk in Wellington Way include:

  • The Post Office
  • Iceland
  • Scrivens
  • Waterlooville Sewing Center
  • M&Co.
  • … as well as the other shops in this precinct

According to the redevelopment design from ACG, other shops in the main Waterlooville Precinct may be at risk, these include:

  • Game
  • PamPurredPets
  • Timpsons
  • … as well as the other shops between NatWest and Store Twenty One

Shops in Wellington Way are beginning to move their premises. ASAP Cat Rescue is in progress of moving from Wellington Way to The Boulevard.

ASAP Cat Rescue Waterlooville
New home for ASAP Cat Rescue Waterlooville

ASAP Cat Rescue moving

Some shops will not be able to move from Wellington Way. Either the shop owners lack the money to secure and refurbish alternative premises, or the shops owner will chose to retire rather than start again.

So what can be done? Probably very little.

Some thoughts on possible scenarios,

  1. Buy the land from the landlord: At a guess, 5 to 10 million pounds will be required. This money would need to be found privately.
  2. Ask Havant Borough Council (HBC) to deny Planning Permission: If denied, the landlord would appeal, and if that appeal was upheld the landlord may just let the closed Wellington Way fall into disrepair.
  3. Ask the landlord to ask for extra time, an early exit, or lease reduction to fund a move of premises.

At this time, no planning permission has been submitted to redevelop the site, in the immediate future, the shops will remain open. Please continue to support them.

Last week we attended a meeting with local businesses and George Hollingbery MP to address this and other issues impacting Waterlooville Precinct. You can find the details of this meeting on our other website, The Waterlooville & Region Business Forum (all local businesses are invited to join, it is free).

The only certainty is that Waterlooville Precinct as we know it is coming to an end.

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Comments

  1. The town centre does not need housing and commercial premises. It needs to be a vibrant shopping precinct where people go to shop. If planning permission is granted it will be a travesty

  14. Unfortunately housing is where the money is and maybe charging these ridiculous rents was in the long term plan anyway?!! No shops, no shoppers, no viable business, Mr Planning, he say Yes! Gets what you want in the long run!!! Sneaky.

  16. Well this certainly appears to be the demise of shopping in Waterlooville. The writing has been on the wall for some time as there are so many vacant units or otherwise charity shops. Quite clearly, as someone has already stated, it is the cost of the rent for these poor shop owners. I feel really sorry for them….it’s all about greedy landlords. Do we really need more housing in Waterlooville as we have two great big estates being built towards Purbrook etc? With all these estates being built locally, we need people to shop in Waterlooville, we need good shops in the town centre, so that people don’t have the need to go into Portsmouth, Chichester or Southampton to shop. What next…the weekly market to go?

  20. Potentially it could be good and help rejuvenate the town centre. There will still be a lot of commercial space in the new plan and Wellington Way is hardly an architectural gem in it’s current state

  34. What about the older generation they’re just going to build a new flats on the roundabout in waterlooville. Where are they going to shop. Maybe the developers should think about the other end of town. It was funny I was reading a piece that was in the coffee shop saying how they built a light railway from cosham to horndean to encourage people to visit waterlooville. It’s a great shame I have lived here for fifty years so I have seen changes but this if it goes ahead will kill the town.

  42. the building work is going to have a negative effect on whats left of the town centre. dust noise etc. i suppose its new work for builders if the jobs are contracted locally

  45. Something has to be done with Waterlooville. Unfortunately Havant Borough Council seem to be concentrating on building Havant town centre up.

    With all the new housing going up around Waterlooville, we need not only shops but leisure amenities too.