Unhappy with supermarket design

I write regarding recent buildings erected in Newark, namely the two medical centres and the new Asda superstore.

I believe the medical centres to be in keeping with the conservation area and historic nature of the town.

It is a pleasure to see well-designed, functional, modern buildings fitting in well with the townscape, which is doubly true of the new centre at the corner of Portland Street and Lombard Street.

The Asda store is, however, another matter.

There are worse buildings, but the only ones I have seen are in the old Eastern Bloc.

In our green times they haven’t even made an effort to provide decent cycle access, although there is a storage facility once you get safely to it.

How could such an awful building be sanctioned in such an attractive town?

How could they allow properties on Pelham Street to be blighted with a facade of white plastic?

It would be interesting to know whether the people who granted Asda permission to build such a monstrosity have any such ugly buildings anywhere near their own homes.

It is possible to build a superstore that blends in with the local area.

Morrisons is brick-built, attractive and blends nicely with the town.

Even those sheds on the out-of-town retail site on Lincoln Road are brick and reasonably attractive and they at least fit in with our need to conserve energy, having good cycle access.

We will have to put up with this awful building for a number of years.

Let us hope it does not last as long as some of the 1960s and 1970s monstrosities like the Social Security offices.

I accept all this is my opinion but I do find it hard to believe that the majority of citizens of Newark and visitors to the town can find anything attractive about the Asda building.