Our story is very similar to that of St Margarets, Twickenham.

Following its acquisition of One Stop Stores, Tesco was allowed to 'barge' their way into our community in July 2004 with no need for planning permission. as it was just a case of one small supermarket being replaced by another.

The store is on a corner of a roundabout which has six roads coming off it – two are “A” roads, one the main road through Whitchurch Village (a suburb of Cardiff) and 3 residential roads. The One Stop store was just a small corner supermarket aimed at the local community.

In its place Tesco opened the Tesco Express knowing there were no parking facilities for staff or customers and no off road loading bay for their deliveries. Foreland Road, where the side entrance to the store which Tesco uses for unloading is, has effectively become part of its car park and a loading and collection bay. The waste disposal can arrive as early as 6.15am and other deliveries have been arriving from 8am. Originally deliveries were from 7am but complaints (also helped by our understanding that the lease only allowed deliveries after 8am) led to the time being put back to 8am. 

Foreland Road is a narrow residential road; if a car is parked on the road another cannot park opposite it and still allow room for a lorry to pass. Deliveries to the store went up from several a week to in excess of 40 a week – although we believed there were more than this. The road is blocked by lorries on a daily basis and is very congested particularly during rush hour and school run times.

Lorries stop in the middle of the road to unload because cars (often visiting Tesco) are parked on yellow line. Lorries reverse from one of the roads back in Foreland Road and often mount the pavement. One resident and her son were nearly crushed against a wall when a driver had not seen them. The road is also used by youngsters on their way to school. Often more than one lorry arrives at a time and again the road would become blocked. Car drivers become frustrated at not being able to get through and on several occasions when cars are not parked on the pavements (which they often are) they are used as roads to by-pass the blockage.

We have been sending photos/letters to Cardiff City Council for the past 2 years, without much success, until recently. At a local residents meeting with Tesco MP Julie Morgan and Councillor Sophie Howe presented Tesco with our photographs of the disruption. Tesco have continually denied that there are any problems in the area. This happened shortly after plans emerged for a further Tesco store at nearby Birchgrove.

Soon after, television company Twenty Twenty Television got involved and Tesco have decided to 'talk' to us. Julie Mcguckian (Corporate Affairs) and David Cogan (Area Manager) have told us that our store is the worst in the UK for delivery and traffic problems. They allege that it is unique.  On 26th September Tesco held a meeting with residents and Councillor Sophie Howe, to try and solve some of the issues. We've asked for later deliveries, smaller vehicles and policing of the area to name but a few.

We have also started to get the police involved and have asked them to sort the illegal parking and other road safety issues. This is being taken forward as a priority under the PACT (Police and Community Together) - a new initiative in Wales. Before this the police were not interested in giving any help at all.

For further information on the Foreland Road Against Tesco (FRAT) campaign, please contact Alison Walden and Kay Bullen at frat666@gmail.com.