Meeting documents

Councillor Bowles

Deputy Leader and Cabinet Member for Economic Development Delivery

 

To consider the attached report.

 

Contact Officer:  Teresa Lane (01296) 585006

(a)          Decision(s)

 

That progress on actions included in the Aylesbury Town Centre Plan since its publication be noted and in particular, those which continue to be a priority, those that will be carried forward into the updated Plan to be published in January, 2017, and those which are no longer a priority.

 

(b)          Reason(s) for Decision(s)

 

            To facilitate progression of the enhancement of the town in accordance with the guiding principles contained within the Plan.

 

 (c)       Alternative Options Considered

 

None as such.  The Cabinet report (available on the Council’s web site) explains the rationale for updating the Plan.

 

(d)       Relevant Scrutiny Committee

 

Economy and Business Development.  That Committee received a report at its meeting held on 5 December, 2016 and endorsed the proposals.  The Committee Chairman attended the Cabinet meeting and elaborated on the Committee’s considerations. 

 

(e)        Conflicts of Interest / Dispensation(s)

 

None.

 

 

 

 

The Aylesbury Town Plan had been published in April, 2014.  It represented the shared vision and commitment of partners to continue to improve the town centre, building upon the multi-million pound investment that had already been made.  In summary, the vision was that Aylesbury:-

 

·         Would be a high profile sub-regional centre for entertainment and the arts, which added a distinctive edge to its market town heritage.

 

·         Would be a distinctive "best in class" modern market town which was attractive, sustainable, safe and accessible.

 

·         Would provide a quality day and evening environment in terms of leisure, retail and food and drink, which would attract and bring together people of all ages and communities from within its catchment.

 

The Plan also set out the challenges facing the town centre and the guiding principles to steer its future development.  AVDC, Aylesbury Town Council and Buckinghamshire County Council had developed the Plan, supported by a range of partners from the private and public sectors, who would not only be involved in helping to deliver the identified actions or improvements, but would also be mindful of the guiding principles when considering proposals for their own assets.  A summary brochure of the full Plan had been widely distributed.  The Plan continued to be an important document, particularly as at the time of publication, the existing but dated Local Plan (2004), was still being used to determine planning applications relating to the town centre.

 

The Town Centre Plan, whilst not a binding document in terms of planning policy, had been used very effectively as a reference point for comments (both positive and negative) made by, for example, the Aylesbury Town Partnership on planning applications.  It had also been widely used both by AVDC and private sector partners to help promote the town centre and attract new operators and investors.

 

Cabinet was advised that in recent months, the opportunity had been taken to ensure that the Aylesbury town centre policies in the draft Vale of Aylesbury Local Plan (VALP) reflected the ethos of the Aylesbury Town Centre Plan.  The guiding principles and vision had also been included within the VALP, aligning the Local Plan and the Town Centre Plan for the first time.  In drafting the text for the VALP, the challenges, vision and guiding principles had all been reviewed.  However, only minor changes had been made to the challenges to reflect the effects of the growth of the internet on traditional retail space.

 

The subsequent Aylesbury Town Centre Growth Opportunity Assessment Study carried out by the Retail Group to provide supporting evidence for the VALP, had confirmed that no other significant changes were needed.  The detail of this Study, which also covered an update on the catchment area of Aylesbury town and the catchment’s socio-economic profile, would be brought to a subsequent Cabinet meeting.

 

In January, 2017, AVDC planned to publish an update to the Town Centre Plan, identifying how the actions listed therein had been progressed.  These covered all areas of the town centre and had each been categorised as one of the following:-

 

 

·         Green – Work which could begin or be completed within current budgets and operational arrangements.

 

·         Amber – Work which could be undertaken within current operational arrangements but revenue or capital funding was needed to deliver it.

 

·         Red – Longer term aspirations which required significant operational and funding capacity.

 

Some 75 actions had been listed in the original Plan, broken down by areas of the town centre, with each having its own mini vision.  In addition, a number of actions applied across the whole town centre.  Progress had been made on 60 actions.  Of the remaining 15, 13 actions continued to be classed as priorities with differing timescales, and 2 were no longer required because legislation had been passed enabling new powers to address these issues.  A detailed commentary on the progress made against each of the actions was submitted, together with an excerpt from a consultation document on the Aylesbury Transport Strategy, detailing planned transport improvements which would be relevant to a number of important actions in the Aylesbury Town Centre Plan.

 

Progress had been made on a range of activities varying from small actions to larger long term schemes as follows:-

 

·         Improvements to the market to include its appearance, the quality of products sold, the range of market types and making it easier for stall holders to pay their rents.

 

·         Improvements to Walton Street through planting, with plans for more major changes as part of the conversion of the old County offices to apartments with associated pedestrian friendly space.

 

·         Forming a stakeholder group to engage Kingsbury landlords and tenants in improving its appearance, making use of the links to the Roald Dahl childrens’ gallery at the County Museum.

 

·         Tackling parking issues in Kingsbury through the introduction of new parking controls.

 

·         Protecting buildings in Church Street/Parsons Fee from damage by large vehicles by installing bollards.

 

·         Bringing empty buildings such as AVDC’s former High Street offices back into use.

 

·          Installing new equipment in the Vale Park skate park

 

·         The opening of the brand new University Campus Aylesbury Vale in the autumn of 2015 by the canal basin.

 

·         Working with landowners and partners to plan the ambitious next step in the Waterside North development, co-ordinating parking plans and the conversion of existing buildings and construction of complementary new buildings.  Work on phase 1 (restaurants, apartments and a public square) would commence in January, 2017).

 

·         Making it easier for people with disabilities to use taxis through the "Fare4all" team in partnership with the Taxi Association and Bucks Disability Service.

 

·         Increasing the scale and profile of town centre events to attract more people and encourage them to spend more time in the town.  For example, the Roald Dahl Festival was now an all day event celebrating childrens’ literature, and the Vale Park had hosted a bigger event to celebrate the lighting of the Heritage Flame at the start of the Rio Paralympics.

 

·         Making use of the strong brands now present in the town centre including Waitrose, Nando’s, Wagamania, Travelodge and the Gourmet Burger Kitchen, to attract interest from other food and beverage suppliers.

 

The Plan update also included some new actions suggested by Aylesbury town stakeholders.  These had all been considered by the Aylesbury Town Centre Steering Group which comprised officer representation from AVDC, Aylesbury Town Council and Buckinghamshire County Council.  Those which would appear in the updated Plan would be those which supported the guiding principles.  The guiding principles were:-

 

·         Principle 1 – Position the town correctly.

 

·         Principle 2 – Be different, rather than a clone, but base it on reality.

 

·         Principle 3 – Offer what the market is seeking to capitalise on the town’s enviable retail catchment.

 

·         Principle 4 – Encourage social interaction.

 

·         Principle 5 – Build community spirit.

 

·         Principle 6 – Take a connected, whole town approach.

 

·         Principle 7 – Appeal to all different town centre users.

 

The format of the published update would be;-

 

·         A full updated Aylesbury Town Centre Plan, including the vision for the future of the town centre, background information, a summary of achievements in recent years since the inception of the original Plan, guiding principles and Aylesbury’s position.  This document would also list all of the action points from the 2014 Plan, showing progress against each.

 

·         A summary document (as before) with key points on the above, highlighting the important progress that had been made and the plans for the future, as well as developments that the Plan was responding to since its original publication.

 

As each action in the Town Centre Plan was progressed, the resources required would be taken into consideration.  To date a variety of sources of finance had been used to progress actions.  These had included Section 106 monies, the redeployment of the monies previously invested in the Visitor Information Centre and AVDC’s Capital Programme.  Any that could not be met within identified resources would be submitted for consideration with an accompanying business plan evidencing how the funding required could be obtained.

 

This matter had been considered by the Economy and Business Development Scrutiny Committee, whose Chairman attended the Cabinet meeting to elaborate upon the Committee’s deliberations.  Overall the Committee had supported the prosed update methodology.

 

Cabinet was impressed with the progress made and endorsed the approach to the update.  During the course of discussions reference was made to the possibility of making Aylesbury a "wi-fi town", and officers were asked to explore how this vision might be funded and implemented.

 

RESOLVED –

 

That the progress on actions included in the Aylesbury Town Centre Plan since its original publication be noted and in particular which of those continued to be a priority, which of those would be carried forward into the updated Plan to be published in January, 2017, and which of those were no longer considered to be a priority.