Almost 200 people attended a public meeting took place at Bishop Auckland Town Hall last Friday to hear the proposed plans for over £50m of investment allocated to Bishop Auckland.
Organised by Bishop Auckland Town Council, members from the Stronger Towns Board were in attendance along with representatives from the Regeneration Department at Durham County Council to give an update and answers questions from the public.
In December 2020, Bishop Auckland was awarded £19.9 million to deliver a programme of infrastructure and building alterations to bring property back into use.
An additional £32.2m has been awarded to Bishop Auckland from the Towns Fund, as well as £20m from the Levelling Up Fund.
It is estimated by 2024 (the end of the Future High Streets Funding period) the town could attract between 430,000 and 660,000 day visitors per year, a huge increase from the pre-2016 levels of 27,000 annually, and this is forecast to grow to 750,000 in subsequent years.
The programme has been designed to maximise the benefits of this unique opportunity for local people, turning around a decade of town centre decline. By carefully channelling and guiding visitors through the town centre, we hope to rebuild the number of town centre users, that has been lost over the years.
The programme will improve infrastructure and facilities around the town to deal with the expected increase in visitors and encourage repeat visits to maximise the benefits that a revitalised town centre can provide.
Durham County Council aim to benefit from private investments around the town to tackle the problem of empty shops and encourage more leisure use of the empty space.
They aim to deliver improvements in the town’s transport, parking and public spaces will help build on the opportunities being brought to the town through investment in its heritage.
Planned improvements include increased car parking spaces in the town, attractive walking routes through the town centre to the heritage attractions from visitor parking, train and bus stations and a redesigned bus station to provide a much-improved arrival point for existing and new users and make way for a new car park.
There will be improvements to some of the road junctions to build traffic capacity for increased visitor numbers and demolition of existing buildings and the improvement of public spaces will connect new visitors to local businesses and the town’s residents to their heritage.
With a high level of empty shops in the town centre, the allocated money will focus on changing the use of some of these buildings to visitor accommodation, restaurants, bars and leisure facilities. This will increase visitor spending from overnight stays and drive jobs for local residents.
The town centre and Auckland Castle will be linked so the new visitor and heritage focussed activities of The Auckland Project will benefit the town centre, complementing existing investments (eg. Auckland Tower, Spanish Gallery and the Mining Art Gallery). Linking grant funding and private investment to change the use of empty space to add needed diversity to the town centre.
The plans include redevelopment of the space previously occupied by WH Smith and Mothercare (9-111 Newgate Street) to provide new food and drink outlets to improve what’s available to town centre users.
Durham County Council will also buy and redevelop four shops to provide a flexible workspace for small and medium sized businesses in the town centre.
The programme will improve a visitors town centre experience by bringing a mix of businesses, tackling vacancies and other rundown, redundant properties. The diversification of high street businesses and the increased capacity for visitors, will help drive growth, helping protect the town’s historic assets, securing private investment in the town and underpinning the future of the town centre.
Bishop Auckland's local community newspaper.
