News: National retailer ready to revamp empty Rotherham unit
A national chain has been given the green light to revamp a large Rotherham retail unit that has had many uses in recent years.
Since Homebase at Parkgate Shopping closed a decade ago, the large unit has been used by Best Buy, Kiddicare and as an outlet for JD Sports Fashion plc's outdoor brands - Millets and Blacks.
Rothbiz reported last year that a planning application had been submitted showing that the Frasers Group was eyeing up the vacant store.
Founded by Mike Ashley in 1982, Frasers Group is now a collection of iconic retail brands - notably Sports Direct, Flannels, GAME and USC.
An updated set of plans from Frasers has now been approved by Rotherham Council that would allow the creation a partial mezzanine for a gym measuring 22,646 sq ft.
The main operators would be Sports Direct and Everlast Fitness Club. Plans also show 6,000 sq ft of space on the ground floor for Fraser Group retailer, USC, along with smaller space for GAME and Evans Cycles. A 7,000 ft unit is also shown which could be sub-let by the group. External alterations include the central entrance feature being moved to the side with another entrance being added.
Sports Direct and USC already have units at Parkgate.
Included in earlier plans, space for designer brand retailer, Flannels has been removed.
As the proposals would take the retail space of the unit up to nearly 70,000 sq ft, and the site is classed as out of town, a retail assessment and sequential test is also included.
Sequential tests ensure that development is located in the most sustainable location first (usually in town centres), before other, less sustainable locations are chosen.
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Approved without going before the council's planning board, planning officers agree that there are no more sequentially preferable sites within allocated centres that are suitable or available to accommodate the proposed development which is based on Sports Direct’s business model to co-locate retailing with a gym. Planners also broadly agree that the application would have no impact on the vitality and viability of any centre.
A decision report adds: "The application site is located within Parkgate Retail Park which is the most successful retail destination in Rotherham Borough. The health check of Rotherham Town Centre within the Retail and Leisure Study focuses on the pressures on the Town Centre arising from competition from Parkgate Retail Park, Meadowhall and the proximity of Sheffield City Centre. The Town Centre has a restricted catchment and a weak market penetration within that catchment. Vacancy rates are a chronic issue in the Town Centre.
"However, there is a strategy to diversify uses and the Council’s Annual Monitoring Report indicates that vacancies do not provide a true reflection of the health of the Centre. The Forge Island Leisure Quarter and developments at Rotherham Market and Riverside Gardens will help to diversify the range of uses within the centre and introduce new activity.
"The Retail and Leisure Study indicates that the health and fitness and gym provision in and around Rotherham Town Centre has been dominated by the Rotherham Leisure Complex. However, since the publication of the Study there has been growth in the gym market. There is now I-Motion Gym, The Gym Group, and JD Gym in the Parkgate area and north of the Town Centre. The Oasis Health Club, Bannatyne’s and gym facilities at the Holiday Inn Hotel at West Bawtry and the Hellaby Hall Hotel at Hellaby provide facilities in the wider Rotherham area. The only gym within the town centre at Rotherham is Next Level Fitness at Quarry Hill.
"It is evident that the health and fitness provision is not a key component of the vitality and viability of Rotherham Town Centre or indeed any other designated centre nearby."
In granting permission, a condition has been included to restrict the disaggregation of the gym and the retail units at a later date, as well as one to stop the new space being subdivided into smaller units.
Frasers Group website
Images: Google Maps
Since Homebase at Parkgate Shopping closed a decade ago, the large unit has been used by Best Buy, Kiddicare and as an outlet for JD Sports Fashion plc's outdoor brands - Millets and Blacks.
Rothbiz reported last year that a planning application had been submitted showing that the Frasers Group was eyeing up the vacant store.
Founded by Mike Ashley in 1982, Frasers Group is now a collection of iconic retail brands - notably Sports Direct, Flannels, GAME and USC.
An updated set of plans from Frasers has now been approved by Rotherham Council that would allow the creation a partial mezzanine for a gym measuring 22,646 sq ft.
The main operators would be Sports Direct and Everlast Fitness Club. Plans also show 6,000 sq ft of space on the ground floor for Fraser Group retailer, USC, along with smaller space for GAME and Evans Cycles. A 7,000 ft unit is also shown which could be sub-let by the group. External alterations include the central entrance feature being moved to the side with another entrance being added.
Sports Direct and USC already have units at Parkgate.
Included in earlier plans, space for designer brand retailer, Flannels has been removed.
As the proposals would take the retail space of the unit up to nearly 70,000 sq ft, and the site is classed as out of town, a retail assessment and sequential test is also included.
Sequential tests ensure that development is located in the most sustainable location first (usually in town centres), before other, less sustainable locations are chosen.
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Approved without going before the council's planning board, planning officers agree that there are no more sequentially preferable sites within allocated centres that are suitable or available to accommodate the proposed development which is based on Sports Direct’s business model to co-locate retailing with a gym. Planners also broadly agree that the application would have no impact on the vitality and viability of any centre.
A decision report adds: "The application site is located within Parkgate Retail Park which is the most successful retail destination in Rotherham Borough. The health check of Rotherham Town Centre within the Retail and Leisure Study focuses on the pressures on the Town Centre arising from competition from Parkgate Retail Park, Meadowhall and the proximity of Sheffield City Centre. The Town Centre has a restricted catchment and a weak market penetration within that catchment. Vacancy rates are a chronic issue in the Town Centre.
"However, there is a strategy to diversify uses and the Council’s Annual Monitoring Report indicates that vacancies do not provide a true reflection of the health of the Centre. The Forge Island Leisure Quarter and developments at Rotherham Market and Riverside Gardens will help to diversify the range of uses within the centre and introduce new activity.
"The Retail and Leisure Study indicates that the health and fitness and gym provision in and around Rotherham Town Centre has been dominated by the Rotherham Leisure Complex. However, since the publication of the Study there has been growth in the gym market. There is now I-Motion Gym, The Gym Group, and JD Gym in the Parkgate area and north of the Town Centre. The Oasis Health Club, Bannatyne’s and gym facilities at the Holiday Inn Hotel at West Bawtry and the Hellaby Hall Hotel at Hellaby provide facilities in the wider Rotherham area. The only gym within the town centre at Rotherham is Next Level Fitness at Quarry Hill.
"It is evident that the health and fitness provision is not a key component of the vitality and viability of Rotherham Town Centre or indeed any other designated centre nearby."
In granting permission, a condition has been included to restrict the disaggregation of the gym and the retail units at a later date, as well as one to stop the new space being subdivided into smaller units.
Frasers Group website
Images: Google Maps
14 comments:
Woo Hoo! Mike Ashley World! Can't wait. No changing rooms to try stuff on and no refunds given. It's a disgrace that such an awful business model is so successful.
Can't be such a awful business model...it's successful!
No matter what is published on here, there is always negative comments. I think that those who go on about ‘the good old days’ are looking back with rose tinted glasses. I’m in my sixties and yes there more shops back in the day, but it wasn’t great. Accept there will only be a few shops in the town centre but progress is being made - new market development, new eateries and a mutiplex cinema by next year with the odd independent. You know what is coming and if you still have to whinge, I suggest you find utopia in another town or city to live in so that you can praise everything- Muppets.
Although you make some valid points here you rather over-egg the cake with your insulting final description of the people with whom you have an issue. I don't know whether or not you are aware, but the term muppet in the ancient language of Sanskrit is a deeply offensive term of abuse, being roughly translated as a person who has had an intimate relationship with a camel.
Morally awful, but very successful.
Mike Ashley not alone there though is he. What about the oil companies, the electricity companies who forcibly install meters,the water companies who pollute our rivers and beaches, the banks, insurance companies etc etc. Ashley is in pretty good company when you come to think about it.
It is easier to find a policeman in Rotherham town centre than a morally ethical company.
That is almost an exaggeration.
From the moment public utilities were privatised and shareholders entered the picture any pretence at the provision of a public service evaporated. Profit became the be all and end all. Competition, the slogan bandied as the rationale for privatisation, was and has remained a sham. Successful privarisedbindustries pay huge salaries to senior managers, huge dividends to shareholders, raise prices for consumers and provide a shoddy service. The unsuccessful ones lose money and are eventually bailed out by the tax payer while services collapse
Now. THAT is immoral
"We need more shops" is the usual cry on here, yet now a new shop is opening it's not the right type of shop! They could give everyone in Rotherham a million pounds each, and people would still find a way to moan about it on here. Try thinking positive people - you might find out you like it.
It is not a new shop. It comprises old shops in different premises. And, just to be clear, are you suggesting that we are in such a sorry state, any shop will do? How about a knocking shop or another sex toy shop like the one in Canklow?
It's not a new shop, it's just going to lead to the closure of Sports Direct and USC at the other end of the retail park. It's filled one unit (albeit a big one), but it's leaving two empty.
You could put a knocking shop in the old Poundland, that'd be interesting.
As long as they open 24 hours a day for the guy who travels to Chesterfield that would be fine
It would if it was just a pound
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