BUDGET supermarket Lidl has been granted a hearing date for an appeal after plans for a new supermarket in a Herefordshire town were rejected by Herefordshire Council.

County planners turned down the scheme, which would have involved demolishing part of the Wolf Business Park on Gloucester Road in Ross-on-Wye and building a store on the 2.2-acre site, in July 2019.

The developers said the plans, which received 16 objections from members of the public and Morrisons Supermarkets, would have created around 100 jobs at the store and refurbished the wider business park.

But planning officers said the scheme would be detrimental to the long term protection of the historic town centre.

They also said Lidl failed to demonstrate why they could not use land or buildings within the defined central shopping and commercial area in Ross.

Other grounds for refusal included the unnecessary loss of trees, road safety concerns and that it would result in the loss of employment land.

The appeal will now be heard by a planning inspector appointed by the Secretary of State on May 20.