The Primary Care Trust (PCT) were delighted with the turn out at last week's public consultation where plans for a new Alderley Edge Medical Centre were revealed, though they are keen to stress that their project has nothing to do with plans to turn Heyes Lane Allotments into a car park.
Nicola Kent, Primary Care Projects Manager at Central & Eastern Cheshire PCT, told me "164 people attended which we were really pleased with. They were all interested and positive, although we did have a percentage of people there to do with the allotments which is an entirely separate issue.
"There were several queries raised about the future use of the allotments situated next to the festival hall site scheme which was presented last week.
"Plans for the new medical centre do not effect the allotments in any way. Our scheme, development and parking is wholly contained within the festival hall site.
"We have 33 car parking spaces within this existing scheme, we currently have 6 spaces at George Street, which are mainly used by the doctors, so 33 is fab - it is such an improvement for us. We don't need any additional parking and have not asked for any."
Nicola added "We only had two people who were wholly against the plans and that was because they didn't like the design, they thought it should be more modern.
"A number were for it but had reservations, these were mainly about the allotments but a couple were concerned about congestion so we need to do some work with highways.
"Most people though were absolutely positive, happy and saying 'let's press ahead with it', 'the plans look wonderful', 'it looks good and in keeping with Alderley Edge'."
Plans for the new medical include a pharmacy located on the ground floor.
Jack Yeranian has been running Cedrics at 67 London Road since 1980, and 10 years ago he took over the second store, located on the corner of West Street, from the Charnley family.
He told me "I had plans 5 years ago to refurbish them both but agreed with the doctors that there was no point doing anything as we might be moving.
"We have permission from the PCT to relocate so we will relocate the shop at No. 67 and refurbish No. 20 to maintain a pharmacy on the high street, because we think it is important.
"We have had so many false starts that I didn't want to get my hopes up but we are very much looking forward to it. There are lots of new services we can put in as well as developing the high street pharmacy."
Talking about the next stage of the process Nicola Kent said "We are going to tweak the plans where we can and hope to be able to submit a planning application at the beginning of February. It is all looking incredibly positive."
