Letter: Wish I had joined the battle to save Newport from developers
I have been following the "Save Newport" campaign with interest and wish that I had perhaps been more vociferous when I was resident in Newport. It was a very different town back then.
The town had the largest employer in the immediate area in Audco, along with Ashworths timber company, it had a livestock market, a railway station, a navigable stretch of canal through the town and it had its own football pitch. All gone.
As for development. Anyone entering from the south is met by the eyesore that replaced the wonderful building that was The Vine Vaults.
Areas like Powell and Price and Powells motors, the football ground along with parts of the Shuker fields and the old Audco pitches are now covered in development or are soon to be.
The old livestock market should have been utilised for the benefit of the town not smothered in housing. But let us not forget that for every home built and sold means cash in Telford and Wrekin's coffers.
From once being a market town it has now become a large urban sprawl. Look at an aerial view and the developers have swallowed up vast areas of once green field land, inevitably some brownfield, from the old rugby pitch in the north to the old station yard in the south, from the Norbroom Marsh area in the east to the Gravelly Walks area in the west, all gone under massive development.
Church Aston is now linked to Newport, Edgmond will probably follow. The Buttercross has effectively been vandalised and the money spent on the work on the canal area would have been better spent on revitalising the canal itself.
The recycling centre was taken away, Sainsburys would not want this next to its prestigious supermarket and T&W want their £21 million for the land.
The next thing will probably be the reintroduction of parking charges on the town car parks but this will not realise much revenue as with the possibility of as many as five supermarkets available to the shoppers the town car parks will be little used.
All the same I wish the campaigners well in their efforts, as I said I wish I had been more proactive, but I still like to shop and use the cafes in the town.
Peter Harman
Tibberton
