What should we read into signs of the government’s place-based approach increasingly focusing policy on neighbourhood renewal? This March saw the publication of two key pointers to such a government focus on addressing decline at the ‘neighbourhood’ level. The rebranding of the Long Term Plan for Towns to the Plan for Neighbourhoods, was accompanied by…
It was a great opportunity for me to be asked the address the role of parking in welcoming places by the organisers of the North East Parking Show. From many of years of encouraging greater collaboration between parking and place managers, I still perceive a gap in the understanding between these two sectors, despite their…
This Best Practice Guide to Community Consultation and Engagement comprehensively defines the necessary standards and processes that as part of designing and delivering active travel schemes. It is probably more pitched at improving the techniques of transport planners than refining the approaches of experienced community engagement professionals. Stakeholder groups The guide defines stakeholder groups who…
Faced with frequent calls from businesses and customers for free parking in towns centres, I often liken it to expecting a free coffee in a town centre cafe. Yes, that might be welcomed though what would the coffee be like and would the cafe stay open for long? Here I look a little more in…
This Best Practice Guide to Place Visioning was written for by Katie Norman of the Design Council for the High Streets Task Force and published in 2024. Introduction to place visioning The guide describes a place vision as a galvanising resource that describes the future aspirations for a specific location. It sets-out how it captures the…
‘Putting partnerships in place’ seems such an obvious prerequisite to revitalising town and city centres, that sometimes it seems surprising to see it promoted as part of good practice. It was great though recently, to be reminded of our work in Lincoln when reading the latest Institute of Place Management (IPM) case study on the…
When the House of Lords Built Environment Committee published the results of its 9-month inquiry into high streets in towns and small cities at the end of November, my immediate reaction was, “What difference will it make at street level?”. Local leadership and empowered partnerships This is not stated as a criticism of the Lords’…
As the Government publishes its English Devolution White Paper, with the stated aspiration of giving local leaders and communities the tools they need, I find myself asking “how local, is local?” Deputy Prime Minister, Angela Rayner MP, explains in her foreword to the White Paper, that it offers a shift of power away from Whitehall…
At the People & Places Partnership, we pride ourselves on finding solutions to pressing problems identified by stakeholders. So great to have residents’ common calls for diversifying town centre retail, business and services, so neatly addressed in this new guide to Tackling High Street Vacancy, published as a last act of the High Streets Task…
Guest blog about teamwork tackling empty shops, by Iain Nicholson MIPM, founder of The Vacant Shops Academy. Why don’t you set a target of reducing high street vacancy in your town or city centre by half in 18 months? Impossible…? What if you learned – as you will from the accompanying ‘Tackling High Street Vacancy’…