By Aileen Robertson

Dunfermline businesses have united in opposition to Tesco building a store in the town’s Carnegie Drive.

The Town Centre Regeneration Company, a consortium of local businessmen and women, believes the High Street would suffer if Tesco was allowed to take over the whole site and sell items other than food.

Tesco has already lodged a planning application for the site, but it will not go to committee for determination until the supermarket giant and the council come to an agreement on parking spaces.

Meanwhile, the business consortium has lodged its own planning application for the site, proposing a scaled-down food only supermarket, food court and office units.

Included in the consortium’s proposal is a listed building consent application to turn the fire station into a pub or nightclub and the group also wants to see the shops, flats and restaurants on the other side of Carnegie Drive demolished to make way for a shopping mall.

A spokesman for the consortium said, “There is major concern among town centre traders over Tesco’s proposed plans to build a massive store on the site of what was Thomson’s World of Furniture.

“Given this could sell everything from food and clothes to large electrical goods, it would be in direct competition with the existing town centre.

“While these new proposals by the Town Centre Regeneration Company would revitalise the Carnegie Drive area, they have also been designed to complement the existing retail and other businesses, enhancing the attractiveness and appeal of the whole of Dunfermline town centre.

“These proposals provide an excellent fit and better balance with the town centre, enhancing its overall retail base and providing much needed central office space.

“They also provide a basis for us to fight to save the town centre as we know it because if Tesco is given planning permission outside the town centre it will divert trade away from the current retail businesses based there.”

What should be done with Carnegie Drive has divided opinion.

While some local traders believe giving Tesco the go-ahead would increase footfall in the town centre, the Fife Federation of Small Businesses fears Dunfermline could turn into a soulless “Tesco town.”

Council planner Kevin Treadwell said both planning applications for the site would have to be judged on their own merits.

“We can’t take one planning application into account when making a decision on the other one.

“And as land owners, the council can decide who to sell the land to,” said Mr Treadwell.

“The Yellowbook study identified the need for a supermarket in the city centre to stop people going out of town to get their groceries.

“It would be a magnet for the city centre.”