WESTERN MORNING NEWS MONDAY JUNE 20 2011 NEWS 5WMN-E01-S2
High Street needs urgent actionto overcome out-of-town giants
Plans for a‘greenerTruro’ goon display
‘Thishas thepotentialto createsomethingreallyspecialfor Truro’
Tim Gray
Detailed plans for a new shop-ping and residential facility inCornwall will go on show tothe public from today.
A collection of artists’ im -pressions for the proposedTruro Eastern District Centrewill be made available on theinternet after developers sub-mitted a planning applicationto Cornwall Council for themulti-million-pound project.
The development, which in-volves a Waitrose store, aCornish food hall, nearly 100houses, a recycling centre anda park-and-ride facility in acollaboration between Corn-wall Council and the Duchy ofCornwall, has been heraldedby some for providing freshbusiness and residential op-portunity, as well as helpingreduce traffic into the city.
However, others have voicedconcerns about whether thedevelopment will suffocate ex-isting businesses in Truro, aswell as contributing to “urbans p r aw l ” which would lead tofurther builds on green land.
It has prompted developersto produce a question-and-answer document designed toalleviate concerns over thescheme, earmarked for farm-ing land owned by the Duchy ofCornwall at the Union Hilljunction where the A39 and theA390 meet just outside Trurocity centre.
Tim Gray, estate surveyor tothe Duchy of Cornwall, said:“When we were first ap-proached about whether wecould make our land available
An artist’s impression of how the new development will look. The A39 Newquay Road is on the right and the A390 St Austell Road runs from right to top left, bordering the development site
ficantly help to save our HighS t re e t ”.
Parking provision needed aradical overhaul to rival the“easy, available, free parking”provided by supermarkets andout-of-town retailers.
“Currently, our car parkingis in the wrong place with pooraccess, badly signposted withpunitive and inflexiblecharg es,” Mr Carpenter said.
“The car parks are generallyowned by the unitary author-ity [Cornwall Council], whoprimarily regard them as anincome stream. They are man-aged with no imagination andlittle consideration of supplyand demand.
“The charges/parking ar-rangements do not seem totake account of the wider eco-nomic impact that car parkingplays in town regeneration.”
Better parking needed to becombined with better trans-port links “developed by theprivate sector and supportedby imaginative councils”.
Town centres also needed“well-funded and profes-sional” management, just liketheir out-of-town counter-par ts.
“How can the high streetc o m p e t e, ” the letter asks. “Itstarts off with a great theor-etical advantage – location, loc-ation and location – but thenpotentially throws it all awaywith a complete laissez faire, adhoc approach with no tenancystrategy and the managementof the shopper experience del-egated to an assortment of non-integrated public sector de-partments and agencies.
“High streets need man-aging like the total business ofa shopping centre with realbusiness plans focused uponbuilding footfall, improvingthe public realm and enhan-cing shopper experience.”
Business rates, which arehived off by central govern-ment, need to be “kept local”with a “proper connection tobusiness rates and the ser-vices we receive with properlocal accountability”.
The group also argues for a10 per cent VAT rate – half thecurrent level – for retail, res-taurants, hotels and tourismbu s i n e s s e s.
“Tourism and its economicmultiplier effect is Falmouth’sbiggest industry,” they added.“If the Government is seriousabout driving economicgrowth through tourism –which is critical in the West-country, the UK’s leading vis-itor destination – then actionto cut VAT on tourism is vital.
“The tourism industry actsas a major economic driverand this is crucial in Fal-mouth, providing income forshopkeepers and farmersa l i ke ”.
A recent survey showed theextent of problems in Devonand Cornwall, with vacancyrates running at 29.8 per centin St Austell, 19.6 per cent inTorquay, 18.8 per cent in Tiver-ton and 18.2 per cent in Red-r uth.
The high street campaignhas been championed by anumber of Westcountry MPs,
including Conservatives Geof-frey Cox, MP for Torridge andWest Devon, and Dr Sarah Wol-laston, MP for Totnes.
In her review, due to end bythe autumn, Ms Portas willadvise on how government,businesses and shoppers cantackle the problem of vacantshops, prevent “clone towns”being created and increase thenumber of small and inde-pendent retailers doing busi-ness in local town centres.
Mr Cameron said: “It’s greatthat the people of Falmouthand the Western Morning Newsare getting involved in thisreview and considering waysin which we can support thegreat British high street.
“We believe the high streetshould be at the very heart ofevery community, bringingpeople together, providing es-sential services and creatingjobs and investment; so it isvital that we do all that we canto ensure they thrive.”
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COMMENT – PAGE 10 >KATE IRONSIDE – PAGE 11 >
we recognised the potential tocreate something really spe-cial for Truro that would putsustainability first.
“By helping to reduce foodmiles as well as car journeysinto the city centre, we cancontribute towards a greenerTruro. That’s what this applic-ation is all about.
“We have been hugely en-couraged by the very positivepublic response to these plans,which local people have helpeds h ap e.”
Visitors to Cornwall Coun-cil’s planning website and the
d eve l o p e r s ’ www.tr uroedc.co.uk page will be able to findanswers to a range of ques-tions, including an assuranceabout quelling urban sprawl.
But independent Cornwallcouncillor Bert Biscoe, an out-spoken opponent of thescheme, said he and severalother contributors to thewww.savetruro.co.uk websitehad major concerns about thep ro j e c t .
“We need to be doing all wecan to preserve fertile land,”he said. “The question toanswer is do we want to be
building houses or feedingch i l d re n ?
“We could have a park andride system but there is a lot ofevidence to suggest people areputting their faith in the trainnetwork. Truro really has achance to set a precedent if itlooked at combining a parkand ride scheme at Probuswith the train network.”
He also said the “buffer zone”designed to protect fringe de-velopments could invite fur-ther builds up to that point.
The whole project could becompleted by 2015.
Retail guruMary Portashas beenurged to visitCornwall tosee theproblemsretailers faceat first hand
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