BCSC - Retail General - Town Centre Environment Awards

Date: 15 Nov 2002

Regeneration and enhancement work undertaken in four UK towns and cities – Warrington, Manchester, Long Sutton and Keighley – has been recognized by the prestigious Town Centre Environment Awards in a national competition run by retail property organisation BCSC.

More than 50 towns and cities across the UK entered the competition – now in its 12th year – which aims to encourage and spotlight town and city centre regeneration. Judges, representing retailers, developers, town centre management and local authority sectors visited a shortlisted eight towns and cities before announcing the winners today (7 November) at BCSC 2002, a national conference for more than 1,200 retailers, developers and local authority representatives from across the UK

Comments John Wheeler, the chairman of developers Centros Miller who chairs the BCSC Town Centre Environment Awards jury:

“The Town Centre Environment awards are a way of acknowledging the efforts undertaken by Government and civic bodies, community representatives, town centre management teams and landlords to improve their surrounding environments. Successful projects are often able to kick start a virtuous circle of improvement and investment. If it is a “nice place to be” then the village, town or city is on a much stronger and more competitive footing with its neighbours.”

Warrington town centre was named winner of the Overall Town Centre Environment Award for its £4.5 million design project centred on Marketgate. The project created an urban garden that included a 5-metre diameter granite and bronze water feature set on a plateau of granite steps and surrounded by bronze and glass columns and rough-hewn granite benches beneath honey locust trees. The theme extended through into Horsemarket with its new granite walled ‘gardens’ and a fibre optic and searchlight-illuminated Water Garden with more granite-walled gardens extending into the Buttermarket area.

Keighley won the BCSC’s Transport & Accessibility Award for its new £3 million bus station. It was cited as a seminal project to replace the town’s 62-year-old bus station with a modern, comfortable, accessible facility that combines modern building materials and techniques with natural stone. The three-year Single Regeneration Budget project was undertaken in association with the City of Bradford Metropolitan District Council, Keighley and District Travel, Keighley Town Centre Management and Land Securities, owners of the adjacent shopping centre.

Manchester’s Cathedral Gardens was the winner of the Design Award. The gardens formed part of the £42 million Millennium Quarter regeneration project following the 1996 bombing with the aim of mixing peace and quiet with occasional intense multi-functional usage - play, contemplation, public art and events - in a safe and secure atmosphere. The gardens comprise a series of skilfully themed lawns, trees, water features, artworks and hard landscaped areas, providing a deliberate contrast with the more urban surrounding civic space. Artworks on the theme of ‘The Seasons’ are integrated into the gardens to form part of a Trail of Discovery and extend the city’s pedestrianisation programme.

The market town of Long Sutton in Lincolnshire won the Community Award following what judges described as an “ambitious, energetic and highly effective programme of renewal, conceived and carried through by the whole community working together.” Following a town ‘health check’ in 1998, a town centre partnership of businesses and residents was formed in association with South Holland District Council and Lincolnshire County Council to encourage trade and regeneration. The partnership raised £750,000 to turn the town’s Market House and Corn Exchange into a new Community Services Centre and also created a youth shelter and basketball court in the Recreational Park and improving links to the town’s Co-Op supermarket among a multitude of focal efforts.

BCSC Commendation Awards went to Southgate, Halifax in the overall Town Centre Environment Award and to Solihull in the Transport & Accessibility Award category

Comments Wheeler:
“The Overall Award reflects the success of Warrington in developing a high quality town centre environment that is safe, pleasant and accessible to all for a variety of business, commercial, social, cultural and leisure uses. It recognises the effective delivery of a concept that envisaged a beautiful, functional and unique town centre experience. The objective to create an apparently simple scheme utilising high-quality materials - principally granite, glass and bronze - based on a focal point linked to a series of garden spaces providing different visual and sensory experiences, has been skilfully achieved.

“Long Sutton’s achievements provide lasting, eloquent testimony to the power of communities working together. Keighley had a proactive community approach in creating a safe, high quality, aesthetically-pleasing 15-stand bus station structure that both complemented and integrated the infrastructure of the adjacent shopping and town centre and will enhance the town’s competitive position and contribute to its continued regeneration.

“Manchester’s Cathedral Gardens project has been achieved with intelligence and sensitivity. It does so, moreover, in a way that reflects the significance of its position within the historic core of the city and responds to the needs of its new and old neighbours alike - Urbis, the Cathedral, the Corn Exchange, the refurbished Triangle Shopping Centre, Victoria Station and Chetham’s School of Music.”

The judging panel for the 2002 awards comprised the Jury Chairman, John Wheeler (Chairman, Centros Miller Limited); John Gregory (Head of Property Services, Eastleigh Borough Council); Tony Hatch (Head of Property, Bhs Ltd); Simon Quinn (City Centre Manager, Reading City Centre Management); Brian Raggett (Senior Director, CB Hillier Parker) and Christopher Robson (Head of Asset Management, McDonald’s Restaurants Ltd.).

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