A consortium of Renaisi, Roger Tym & Partners and Space Syntax has recently been appointed by Tower Hamlets Council to produce a town centre spatial strategy for the borough.
The strategy, which will be completed in October 2008, requires detailed research into the borough’s retail and town centre provision and will set out a vision and strategy for the borough’s town centres to 2020. It will also be used as a tool to inform the local authority’s Community Plan, Local Development Framework (LDF) and Regeneration Strategy.
The work will be undertaken in two distinct phases:
Phase 1 will primarily consist of gathering evidence to understand the function, performance and potential of Tower Hamlets’ town centres and retail provision in meeting the needs of existing and future communities. The research will frame the development of the strategy and will include scoping the socio-economic and spatial properties and value of the borough’s town centres; undertaking a retail capacity study; mapping the local and regional economic context; and identifying growth pressures and development and investment opportunities.
Phase 2 of the work will be the production of a town centre spatial strategy, which will be informed by extensive consultation with a wide range of key stakeholders drawn from across the community.
The strategy will set out the vision for the borough’s town centres to 2020, including identifying their specific role and function; establishing priorities and strategic interventions; and formulating a delivery and implementation programme which promotes sustainable town centre growth and development and supports the emerging priorities set out in the SCS and LDF.
This is in line with the Government’s new Planning Policy Statement (PPS) 12: Local Spatial Planning which states that spatial planning should aim to produce ‘a vision for the future of places that responds to the local challenges and opportunities, and is based on evidence, a sense of local distinctiveness and community derived objectives.’
Of the consortium that has been appointed, Cllr Marc Francis, lead member for Housing and Development at Tower Hamlets Council said:
“This is a really exciting time for Tower Hamlets. We are facing massive growth, driven in part by the success of Canary Wharf as an international financial centre and our position as one of the host borough’s for the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games.
“This, together with the creation of around 32,000 new homes and 100,000 new jobs over the next decade, presents real opportunities for East Enders, but it also presents big challenges too. One of the biggest of those is how we boost our town centres so they serve local people much better.”
“We believe that the consortium led by Renaisi has the professional expertise, the depth of local knowledge, and the commitment to innovation needed to ensure that the growth of our town centres is developed and managed in a sustainable way.”
Commenting on the appointment, Rob Pearce, Director of Strategy at Renaisi and Project Lead, said:
“We are delighted to be working with Tower Hamlets to develop their Town Centre Spatial Strategy. It is a very exciting project, which requires a detailed understanding of how places work and why they matter. We believe we have assembled a unique partnership, which draws together specialists in town planning, regeneration, economic analysis and spatial economics to ensure that the borough’s town centres are vital and vibrant places which bring together and benefit all communities, now and into the future”.