On 12 February 2025, we received the following statement from Lochailort, the owners of the Kennet Centre, regarding the revised proposals (now known as “Old Town Newbury”) for the redevelopment of the area. You can read more about this in this separate article.
“Thank you for your positive coverage in relation to our new Old Town redevelopment proposals for the outdated Kennet Shopping Centre. We were thrilled with the tremendously positive and enthusiastic response we have received form everyone who has visited the Old Town exhibition shop. The members of the public were particularly excited and pleased with our proposals.
“One of the elements that was discussed in some detail was nighttime security and this will be secured with self-closing and opening electronic pedestrian gates as well as a significant number of well-placed 24-hour-monitored CCTV cameras, as well as regular night-time security patrols. Please forgive me as we don’t want it to sound like it is a problem – it’s just so we deter and avoid issues, given we are in the town centre and abut various pubs and leisure facilities.
“We have received positive feedback from the Newbury Society – [you can read that statement here] – and other interested individuals.
“Whilst everyone seems to welcome and support the scheme, there are one or two areas where opinions differ. But in themselves I don’t believe that these differences are sufficient to derail our proposals. I have to particularly commend the Councillors and other members of the public who, put up with, and attended two of the presentation sessions, and I am very grateful for their support.
“On a more difficult subject, we have been asked what we are doing with the Eagle Quarter (3) scheme that was recommended for approval but subsequently refused on 8 January. We have appealed this scheme as we believe that this scheme has merit: it was “strongly recommended” for approval as it conformed to both centre government and West Berkshire’s adopted planning policies. It is a completely different scheme but none the less a considerable number of the people who I have met have said that they liked it and felt some regret that it was not going forward.
“The Old Town planning application has been submitted, and we hope that those people who have been to the exhibition will continue to maintain their strong interest in seeing the scheme through to a positive outcome – information on the scheme is available on our website, www.oldtownnewbury.com.”
