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Town
Llanelli market still trading, new hall on Vaughan Street by 2028
The butcher, the wool shop and the phone stall are still open six days a week. Over their heads the 1969 car park is running out of life. The council wants them in a new hall two streets away before the old one comes down.
Llanelli Indoor Market is open Monday to Saturday, 8.30am to 5pm, under the Murray Street multi storey. The council says it stays open through the move. The move itself is now drawn: a two storey hall at 8 to 14 Vaughan Street, with 14 shops on the ground floor, about 80 stalls on the first floor, a cafe up there, escalators, a glass atrium and a front of green glazed brick. Architects are AHR. Port Talbot contractor Andrew Scott is lined up to build it. The present market and the car park over it are due to be demolished once traders have gone, by 2028. Demolition money was put in the county’s 146.7 million pound five year capital plan in January.
Today’s hall gives about 3,664 square metres, 17 shop units and around 110 stalls, reached from the Stepney precinct and by the underground walk from Cowell Street. That is more floor than the drawings for Vaughan Street. Space is the argument that will not die.
What the drawings changed
Traders met the design team twice, most recently on 6 June. They pushed stalls off a hidden first floor. The answer was open voids, escalators and the upstairs cafe. They objected to shops upstairs. All retail was moved to the ground floor. They disliked the first orange finish. The images now show green brick. The site takes the former Woolworths, now Bargain Buys, a vacant unit beside it, and a former pub at number 14 that the council bought to make the plot big enough.
A statutory pre application consultation ran to 7 August, before a full planning application. Cllr Hazel Evans, cabinet member for regeneration, said the market would keep trading and that any move would be planned around traders and customers. The official line is a “vibrant destination” that keeps the market at the heart of the town.
Split among the stalls
Miriam Phillips, fruit and veg by St Elli, said the pictures looked all right and that it was early days. Gabor Hetesi of Gabe’s IT Repair called the plans promising and asked about timescales and the new rent. Parvez Akhtar of Parvez Fashions was against them. He wanted the present market upgraded and empty shops in the town filled first. He said the new hall would be too small and that traders need room to show stock.
That fight is older than the green brick. Last autumn Emma Hughes of butcher and deli Bwyd Blasus said she would rather stay, that people in Llanelli know where the market is, and that the move was being forced. Peter Norrie, who runs three stalls, asked why a new roof could not go on the building they already have. Anne Reid, “Anne the wool” at Select Wool Shop, said a market should stay a market, not be made posh. Sharon Bowler of Beauty 2 Bubbles had already accepted that the car park over them would not last for ever.
The council published its own numbers from a July trader meeting: 85.71 percent of those who answered agreed Vaughan Street was the only realistic option, and 90.47 percent said they would work with the authority on the plans. Those percentages are from the people who filled in the form. They are not a head count of every stall.
Still a market this week
Walk it now and it is still the usual Llanelli indoor: Bwyd Blasus on the meat, Beales Linens, Blodau Elli on the flowers, BAL Phones, Cards Are Us, Anything and Everything promising you ring we bring. Pop up space is 10 pounds a day for three square metres if a pitch is free. The Thursday and Saturday outdoor market still runs in town, 9am to 4.30pm.
The car park above was built in 1969. The council has said it is safe and near the end of its structural life. That is why the market cannot stay under it. Whether Vaughan Street, with fewer square metres and stalls on two floors, holds the same custom is the question that opens in 2028, not on a consultation form.
The Chronicle will follow the planning application, the rent schedule, and how many of the present traders take a pitch in the new hall.