Lidl seeks to build new Navan store

Retail group Lidl is proposing to build a new discount food store on a site beside its existing supermarket on the Trim Road in Navan.

The new store would replace the existing store which opened in 2010 and it is intended is that the existing store would be repurposed under a subsequent planning application.

In the planning application lodged with Meath County Council, Lidl Ireland GMBH is seeking permission provide a new discount foodstore supermarket with ancillary off-licence sales adjoining Lidl, at Trim Road and Reask Road, Navan.

The development includes the construction of a single storey (with mono pitch roof and internal mezzanine plant deck) licensed discount foodstore supermarket with ancillary off-licence sales measuring 2,598 square metre gross floor space with a net retail sales area of approximately 1,743 sqm with the existing Lidl foodstore operation to relocate to this new store.

Planning permission is also sought for the reconfiguration and expansion of associated car parking and internal traffic and pedestrian circulation routes, a new/relocated vehicular and pedestrian access via the existing Reask Road, and provision for a pedestrian route within the site to the Northeastern site boundary (towards Beaufort College / St Columbus Crescent).

Permission is also sought for free standing and building mounted signage, a covered trolley bay, external refrigeration and air handling / conditioning plant and equipment, an ESB substation, roof mounted solar panels, public lighting, hard and soft landscaping, cycle parking, boundary treatments, provision of site drainage, utility and services infrastructure and connections, and all other associated works.

The cover letter submitted with the application outlines that the new store is intended to replace the existing adjacent Lidl store, and that the two premises would not both operate. It states: "It is intended that the existing store will be repurposed (to non convenience use), to be progressed under a subsequent planning application. It is envisaged that the unit could be used for lower order comparison / bulky goods, however the ultimate end user it not yet known. It would thus be premature to seek a specific land use as part of the subject application."

The proposed store would result in a marginal scale of net convenience floorspace of circa 431 sqm – an increase of 38 per cent compared to the existing store.

It is estimated that the new Lidl store will provide up to five to 10 additional direct full time jobs, in addition to the existing full time equivalent staff level.

The cover letter also states that the existing store on site is "no longer suitable to cater for customer expectations and the existing scale of demand and to allow for incremental increase in trade in the short to medium term, having been scaled and designed for requirements a number of years ago".