Tesco dancing on Asda's grave at the Mart in Thurso?

[Raymond Taylor]

To summarise, you want to spoil the view by building an Asda or similar in the field next to Pennyland Farm. But why would Asda or whoever want to build a new supermarket right next to the big brand new Lidl? You also want to build on the land next to Victoria Walk in order to spoil one of the finest views in the world. You don't know how high your proposed hotel is compared with the Weigh Inn so you don't know how much worse your hotel might look compared to the Weigh Inn. This is land that will be a designated 'green belt' in the next council plan unless you can pull the wool over the eyes of the people of Thurso and convince them you're doing them a favour. I recommend that the people of Thurso should look at the Council's proposals for the expansion of Thurso to the west of the town. Raymond is proposing to spoil the finest vista by building a large hotel and a large number of chalets and a lot of retail outlets on the very last green fields in that area according to the planners' recommendations. I do not support that.

It's a democracy and everyone is entitled to an opinion so I feel I have to answer.

So what you are saying regarding the hotel is - the Highland Council planners will have a couple of years off and will allow me and world renowned architects John Thompson and Partners to design a hotel that will block out the sun without them noticing. If I am lucky enough to get the land allocated for tourism by them in the first place. Not a carefully designed 7m tall building with a flat green roof as per our widely distributed plan.

We will also be allowed to build a "large" number of chalets not six or seven units again as per my plan. Which will be no taller than the mausoleum which is hardly noticeable. The park of course will now be much smaller than the promised 19 acres because of the dozens of chalets built and I will sneakily turn what's left into a minefield and put barbed wire round it to sort the townsfolk out good and proper. I suppose you also think the proposed bandstand will actually be a place to sacrifice goats.

On to ASDA or any retailer for that matter - the almost 3000 people who signed the petition for an ASDA at Pennyland have all changed their minds, not one of these people now want a job, consumer choice or the national price for fuel over the next 20-30 years, the life of the next local plan. Remembering if a retail site is not included in the plan it will probably not happen during its lifetime.

That goes with the business, technology, housing and other land I am looking to get allocated. I have users waiting in the wings interested in each of these.

Sequential testing proves Pennyland next to the Mart site is the place to build for the good of the town and this is fact.
Towns elsewhere are bending over backwards to attract inward investment and get fit for the future. We need a local plan that beats them all and that will be one of the key themes to my final submission to planners. Scrabster is doing its bit and we need the infrastructure to support this if Thurso is to have any chance to stop its decline.

Anything we develop wherever it is will be done with taste and consideration to the people of Thurso if of course the land is allocated.

My hotel plans are public knowledge and the sizes are in the brief I wrote. People aren't stupid and your scaremongering agenda is obvious.

Two days now to deadline day.