Monday February 4 2019 THE NATIONAL MOTORCYCLE MUSEUM, BIRMINGHAM
talking trade ‘The Grimsey Review 2’: the 25 recommendations in brief
1Establish an empowered organisation or Town Centre Commission with a defined remit to build a 20-year vision/strategy for their unique place.
2Create a national independent organisation, to capture and share best practice from towns online for Town Centre Commissions to access.
3Accept that there is already too much retail space in the UK and that bricks and mortar retailing can no longer be the anchor for thriving high streets and town centres. They need to be repopulated and refashioned as community hubs, including housing, health and leisure, entertainment, education, arts, business/office space and some shops.
4Embed libraries and public spaces at the heart of each community as digital and health hubs that embrace smart technology.
5Establish common key performance indicators to measure the economic and public health of each town.
6Set up a National Urban Data knowledge portal to support the implementation of data platforms for high streets and town centres.
7Local authorities should establish events teams to manage a comprehensive programme of activities that complement the Town Centre Commission Plan by driving footfall to local high streets.
8Accept that there is no confidence in business rates. It is accelerating shop closures in many towns and is an outdated and unfair tax that needs a major overhaul. An immediate independent review should look to replace it with either a land/area/property value or sales tax.
9Give local authorities powers to introduce penalties and incentives for landlords of commercial properties that are left empty for more than 6- 12 months. Review the existing property use class system to increase flexibility and look to establish a change of use to make the asset productive.0
10Introduce clear high street assets ownership accountability by establishing a landlord register for each town.
11Enable the change of use process through new legislation to be used to convert entire sub-high streets to residential or other uses and relocate successful independent businesses to the main commercial centre.
12Connect planning applications to the business plan for each town and ensure that developments fit within the criteria set by the Town Centre Commission Plan.
13Give local authorities ultimate power in granting planning permission in line with the Town Centre Commission Plan.
14Give local authorities powers to introduce incentives and penalties to prevent the process of ‘land banking’ for future speculative developments.
15Local authorities should appoint high quality design teams to create and enhance spaces for civic and social use.
16Create a flexible planning framework to unlock the potential of areas by encouraging SMEs and making it easy to pilot new business concepts at low risk.
17Review Compulsory Purchase Order (CPO) provision and make it more straightforward for local authorities to enforce a CPO to benefit the Town Centre Commission Plan.
18Review and amend the planning use class system legislation to enable greater flexibility of building use and also to distinguish between the specific use of logistics warehousing used for direct retail sales.
19Create a nominal maximum charge (£1) for the first two hours of parking in town centres, while introducing 30 minutes of free parking in high streets with no paid extension option.
20Review and evaluate future use and relevance of out-of-town shopping parks, prepare a plan to bring unwanted space back into use to benefit the community in line with the Town Centre Commission Plan, while applying a Town Centre First policy and calling for no further out- of-town development.
21Local section 106 income or any planning gains should be used to support the delivery of the Town Centre Commission Plan.
22Establish a review of the Business Improvement Districts (BIDs) process, which has relevance in big urban conurbations but needs more scrutiny in smaller towns. Consider replacing BIDs with Community Improvement Districts (CIDs) embracing all the stakeholders, occupiers, owners and service providers in an area including the local authority.
23BT and Virgin Media need to offer a Town Digital Package to ensure ongoing digital transformation to the top 13 cities and all 1,048 UK high streets in smaller towns.
24Install LED lights in street lamps to improve the quality of light on the street, while minimising costs. The lamps will also provide improved security as they can include CCTV cameras and integration with police systems for fast response.
25Provide free public Wi-Fi and well-connected workplaces that support flexible working patterns and attract freelancers to high streets and town centres
• Michael Weedon is chair of the FSB [Federation of Small Businesses] Retail Policy Unit and managing director of exp2 Ltd, which carries out projects including research and report creation for clients in the retail industry, including data providers, place managers and individual retailers. He established exp2 in 2016 from a leading trade association role.
Michael’s contact details are: Mobile: 07411 763 551 Email:
Michael.weedon@exp2.co.uk Tw: @michaelweedon
July/August 2018
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