Hereford city filling station plans passed

A Hereford petrol station has been the all-clear to add new services.

NTS Motor Fuel applied for planning permission in December to extend the forecourt shop at the Texaco garage in Commercial Road, and to add two jetwash bays, two electric vehicle charging points, and 11 new parking spaces.

For Hereford Civic Society, Peter Taylor said the plan would increase traffic at the garage, conflicting with the stated aim of making Commercial Road more pedestrian- and cycle-friendly, and suggested cars should access it from the nearby A465 City Link Road instead.

Similar points were made by city councillor Jemery Milln, objecting in a personal capacity.

The likely extra traffic at the garage was “unacceptable given this is the key walking route between the railway station and the city centre”, he wrote, while the new fixtures would be of “incongruous form and materiality” at “a key gateway location for the city”.

The city council itself did not object, nor did Welsh Water, the Environment Agency or the council’s highways, ecology or contaminated land officers.

Planning officers concluded that the garage already “detracts from the appearance of the area” and that the proposals would even amount to “a modest improvement of the current mundane filling station”.

And while acknowledging the “inevitable intensification of use”, the impact of this “would not be severe”, they said.

A condition attached to the permission allows a council-nominated archaeologist to observe the work and record any finds – although “archaeological interest of the site is likely to have been compromised both by its current use and by its previous industrial use over the last 150 years”, the planning officers added.

Ground contamination checks must also be carried out, and there is to be no unpermitted extra outdoor lighting at the garage, which must remain in its current use.