This monstrosity has been foisted on us

✒ BACK in 2005, in the old railway cutting near The Clock Tower on the outskirts of Cheltenham, a huge structure - half turquoise and half brick - gradu ally took shape as the call centre for the now defunct Chelsea Building Society.

It is known locally as Parkwood Scrubs by its adjacent neighbours.

Next to it, another monstrosity is currently being foisted upon Charlton Kings, in the form of a new Lidl.

Three beautiful mature trees were cut down as they would have been in the way. Instead there is to be a high blank wall looming over the road and the cottages opposite.

I appreciate that Council needs the business rates from Lidl having permitted this construction, apparently by the very slimmest of margins, and I realise that in these straitened times, people will be grateful for a discount store, but just why it was allowed to be erected there is very hard to fathom.

Fiona Wild

Cheltenham