Morrisons and IKEA sites approved by council

Exeter City Councillors have given the go ahead on plans to build an IKEA store in Exeter and for the new Morrison’s supermarket in the council’s planning meeting yesterday evening.

However while the plan was approved by the council, the planning permission at the Morrisons site has been suspended for six months until further research can been carried out by the Highways agency.

The new Morrisons store will be located at the Police headquarters in Middlemoor while the Ikea Store will be on the development site near Sandy Park.

The Morrisons proposal includes a petrol station, 83 homes and a new criminal justice centre for the police.

The IKEA development also includes plans for up to 220 new homes which were approved.

The IKEA store is expected to bring 380 new jobs into the area which could see a significant reduction in those seeking work in the city.

Planning officers argued that the store will have a major impact on the whole economy of Exeter, in particular generating more trips and money to the city centre as people divert away from the nearest Bristol store.

Research by the council predicts that the extra people travelling in to Exeter city centre from the Ikea store will spend between £7,800,000 and £19,500,000 annually.

Concerns had initially been raised by Devon County Council over a view that there were too few parking spaces available at the IKEA store and in response the number of parking spaces has been  increased to 1,004.

This had lead to concerns that the roads surrounding the development could be affected including the potential for traffic queues onto the nearby A379.

However both the highways Agency and Devon County Council believe that junction 30 of the M5, due to be improved by April 2015, will be able to cope with the increased traffic.