From Stockport Council:

By the end of September, six people will have successfully completed the business training provided by Market Start and started a new life as a trader on Stockport’s fabulous and historic market. By Friday 4th September (the day before the Historic Street Market family event on Saturday 5th September) we will have:-

· Nicola, trading in cupcakes, tray bakes and wedding favours

· Irene, trading in fashions for the mature woman

· Caroline, trading in children’s formal wear, occasion wear and fancy dress outfits

· Shilpa, trading in scented candles, soaps, bath bombs and all the mini treats you could want

By the end of September they will be joined by Marcus, trading in collectable toys, comics and games and Nick who will be trading in baby essentials and baby wear.

If you know of anybody in that situation or who has been out of work for some time, why not come along to our open mornings and see if you have what it takes to join us? Open mornings are held on the first Tuesday of every month.

View the Market Start leaflet (pdf) or telephone the Market Office to book a place – 0161 480 1564.

Umbro, based at Cheadle Royal, has won the contract to supply football kits to all 23 English football teams up to and including the 2018 world cup (no, I had no idea there were 23 national teams either).

As the Manchester Evening News reports

Cheadle-based Umbro will manufacture the national side’s strip until summer 2018, which will take in the World Cup in Brazil in 2014, and the 2018 competition, for which England is in contention as host.

Umbro will also be a sponsor of Wembley Stadium, the FA Cup and the National Football Centre in Staffordshire.

The deal, for an undisclosed sum, was announced on the day that members of the England team including Manchester United’s Wayne Rooney revealed the new Umbro strip which they will wear during the Euro 2012 qualifying campaign.

 As an aside, I should point out that companies like Umbro don’t end up in our area by chance.  Stockport Council does a lot of work on attracting businesses into the area, and supporting those already here, through things like Stockport Boost.

The outcome of spending that money might not be as immediately apparent as when we’re fixing potholes or cleaning the streets, but done well - as it is in Stockport - it can repay the tax money spent many times over and bring jobs and prosperity to an area.

It looks like the Gothic pub near Gatley Green has closed - for now at least.

I don’t have any firm information on why, and I don’t know if it’s likely to re-open as a pub.

Gothic’s closure follows on from that of the Red Lion a few months back and leaves three pubs in Gatley - the Prince of Wales, the Horse and Farrier and the High Grove on Silverdale Road.

J J Mundys, Gatley’s greengrocer, sadly closed its doors on Saturday.

I knew it was on the cards,  but I didn’t know when.  I’d like to thank Pete and everyone who’s worked there over the years. A sad loss for the village.

I’ve been talking to various bits of the Co-op for a while about getting a permanent ramp for the Gatley Green branch.

The other Gatley Co-op has an external ramp, but at the Gatley Green one the pavement simply isn’t wide enough.  Instead, they have a removable ramp which staff will put down for you if you ring the bell.  Many elderly and infirm residents have told me they’re not comfortable with that and they’d really like a proper, permanent ramp.

Now I’ve had confirmation from Vicky Jolly the The Co-operative Group that a permanent ramp will be installed inside the store, though as always it’ll take a little while to happen.  Good news!

The Stockport Express has the news that Stockport’s Westgate Department Store is to close later this year, with a Primark store opening up on the site in 2011.

Although  a little sad, I can’t say I’m totally surprised.  The store’s been looking fairly tired for a while now, and the current owners admit that, whilst still profitable, it isn’t generating enough money for a substantial redevelopment.

As reported in Messenger Newspapers, Trafford Council has given planning approval for a new business park on the old National Grid site at Partington.

The plan is to develop the site over the next few years with up to 27 units which may include research, light industry, workshops, storage or distribution but not (as currently planned) standalone offices.

Partington lies on the western edge of the Borough of Trafford, about half way between Manchester and Warrington centres.

An application has been submitted to the Council to convert the launderette at 78 Church Road, by Gatley Green, to a take-away/pizza delivery.

As usual, I won’t comment on this as, were I to come out for or against at this stage, I might not be able to participate in taking the decision if it comes before the councillors.  However, both Pam and I are concerned about having too many take-aways and fast food places in our villages.  There are provisions in our planning rules to stop that happening, though there’s a debate to be had on whether they go far enough.

You can view the application here.  As there are already seven objections, the application will either be rejected by the planning officers, or will come to Cheadle Area Committee to be considered by councillors.

Although it’s in Manchester, not Stockport, I’ve received a letter from Rank Group proposing a new casino on the site of the old bingo hall at Parrs Wood.  I’ve scanned in the letter so click on the thumbnail images below to see it in full.

You’ll see there are four public consultation sessions in July with Rank Group proposing to submit a planning application in August.

I see from the Council that the Co-operative Store is applying for a license to sell alcohol from 30 High Street, Cheadle, SK8 1AL.

That’s the old Ethel Austin store between Boots and Costa, so I can only assume the Co-op are planning a convenience store at that location and are, sensibly, looking to get the right approvals in place before they commit.

Interesting. Anyone got any thoughts on that one?

From the Council:

With the help of the Stockport Boost campaign, 1047 families across Stockport have been able to take advantage of the national ‘Home Access’ scheme which provides free computers to help support learning and development. The scheme has helped around half of all eligible low-income families in Stockport gain access to a computer and get online at home. This is an exceptionally high rate of successful applicants compared with our ‘near neighbour’ Local Authorities of a similar size.

For more information about the Stockport Boost campaign visit the Council Website at www.stockport.gov.uk/boost.

I was very pleased to see that the new bollard on the corner of Gatley Road and Old Hall Road was installed on Tuesday.  This was something I worked with the Council on after a lorry clipping the kerb shot a fragment of concrete that hit our crossing lady in the throat (luckily, she wasn’t injured).

Sadly, though, the Nat West bank on the opposite side of Gatley Road will be closing in August.  Wasn’t it Nat West who ran a big advertising campaign about how important their branch network was?

Stockport celebrated double success at the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) North West Awards 2010 last week. The newly restored Covered Market Hall won the accolade of best regeneration project.

The Grade II Listed Market Hall, which has undergone a £1.7 million restoration with support from the Heritage Lottery Fund, has been transformed into a vibrant retail and community space. A second scheme in Stockport, the Citadel on Middle Hillgate, was highly commended in the residential category.

This scheme by Johnnie Johnson Housing Trust involved a major redevelopment of the landmark former Salvation Army Hall building into 14 shared ownership flats. The contest short-listed 49 projects from across the North West, at an awards ceremony held at The Monastery in Gorton.

A range of new schemes to improve the look of local high streets and reduce the number of vacant shop units is to be launched for consultation by Stockport Council as part of the Stockport Boost Campaign.

As part of a wider business support programme, over £100,000 will be invested in the launch of a range of new schemes designed to be attractive to both landlords and agents of existing vacant units, as well as those interested in occupying vacant premises.

The proposals include grants to encourage and assist owners of vacant properties, new businesses and not-for-profit community groups to improve and occupy vacant units. Plans also include a new “Makeover Team” who will carry out improvements and modifications to make empty shops more attractive and saleable.

The programme got underway with a consultation event at Stockport Art Gallery on Friday 21st May at 10am. For further information please contact Graeme Vout, telephone 0161 474 4562, email graeme.vout@stockport.gov.uk or Brian Nash, telephone 0161 474 4519, email brian.nash@stockport.gov.uk.

Vince visited us in Cheadle a couple of months back, but he wasn’t a cabinet minister then. He’s much more important now - prepare to be excited.

Over 20 local businesses attended an international trade clinic in Stockport to find out more about selling goods or services around the world. The event showcased the range of support available to businesses looking to expand into new markets abroad.

Attendees received valuable information about the assistance available to companies looking to take advantage of international trade, with specific insight into trading with South America, North America and Europe.

For more information call the Economic Development team at Stockport Council on 0161 474 3737 or email econdev@stockport.gov.uk.

Over 100 local businesses had the opportunity to pitch for work from Stockport’s public sector organisations at the Council’s third Meet the Buyer event.

The event, organised as part of the Stockport Boost campaign proved popular with over 270 one-to-one appointments taking place, allowing local businesses to sell their goods and services to public sector buyers.

Meetings were available with a range of buyers from across the public sector including Stockport Council; associated companies NPS Stockport, SK Solutions, Stockport Homes and Pure Innovations; as well as other public sector organisations such as Stockport Sport’s Trust, Stockport College, Stockport NHS and Stockport PCT.

A wide range of opportunities and services were in demand, ranging from a handy person role through to large-scale commercial contracts.

Further information on the Stockport Boost campaign is available by logging on to www.stockport.gov.uk/boost.

As reported in Craine’s business:

BSkyB is to create 550 jobs with a new Sky call centre in Stockport.

The 23,500 sq ft regional office in the St Peter’s Square development in the town centre will open in June.

The centre will handle enquiries for pay television, broadband and telephony and recruitment is expected to start in March. Roles will include training, coaching and HR, as well as customer services

This is something the Council has been working very hard to secure for some time.  We’ve known for a couple of weeks that a big company was moving in; now we know it’s Sky.  Great news for the town.

At Cheadle Area Committee yesterday councillors rejected an application for a small tapas restaurant at 76 Stockport Road, Cheadle.

Residents were concerned about parking, noise and smells from the restaurant.  Planning officers actually recommended rejection on a slightly different basis - that the location was outside the “district centre” (in this case, the centre of Cheadle village).

Councillors were concerned in particular that, in granting permission for a restaurant at that location, we would be giving permission not just for this venture but for any future one that might come along should it fail or close up.

The result was a rejection of the application.

I admire the aim of the two brothers in wanting to set up a small Spanish-style community restaurant, and I wish them every success in finding the right location and making a go of it.

This was application DC/043443.

Stockport’s first ‘Enterprise Centre’ has been launched as part of the Stockport Boost programme, offering free help and guidance to new businesses or those thinking of setting up a business.

The Centre is located in the Business Incubator at Broadstone Mill in Reddish, Stockport Enterprise Centre and offers companies up to three years of free one-to-one advice, general awareness sessions, assistance with business plan generation and networking opportunities.

The Centre will act as a focal point for business start up support and assistance across the borough. Business Link’s Intensive Startup Support Programme (ISUS) is also available through the Centre. ISUS aims to help people to start their own business through a series of workshops and one-to-one support.

The Centre has been launched as part of an expansion of the Stockport Business Incubator which now operates 37,000 square feet of high quality, flexible workspace at Broadstone Mill. It is home to 24 small businesses and over 100 employees.

For information on Stockport Enterprise Centre call the Council’s Economic Development Team on 0161 474 3734 or 0161 474 3737. Information on ISUS is available through Business Link Northwest on 0845 00 66 888.

For this year’s Fairtrade Fortnight Stockport Council is asking all employees to join in with ‘The Big Swap’.

For two whole weeks the Council will be asking staff to swap their usual products for Fairtrade products. This could mean swapping their usual bananas for Fairtrade bananas, their usual cotton socks for Fairtrade cotton socks, and their usual cuppa for a Fairtrade cuppa.

This means that every time you go shopping, you can use your wallet to make a stand. The Fairtrade Foundation is hoping that over one million swaps will be made over the course of the fortnight.

For more information on how you can help please visit the The Big Swap.

The ten local authorities in Greater Manchester have a decision to make over the next few weeks: whether to go ahead and form a new “City Region” - a body which would see the ten authorities working together to deliver transport (as now), post-16 education funding, skills & training funding and inward investment.

In Stockport we had an all-party briefing from officers, including Howard Bernstein who’s closely involved with  the plans.

The aim is for Stockport to make its decision at an Extraordinary General Meeting prior to the budget meeting on  25th Feb, with the Manchester-wide decision being taken before the General Election.

I should say up front that I haven’t made up my mind on this one.  I can certainly see some logic to it, but I’ve some big concerns too.

The current situation

After Greater Manchester County Council was abolished in 1985, the ten metropolitain borough councils established AGMA - the Association of Greater Manchester Authorities - as a voluntary way to work together where it made sense to do so.

Four “joint authorities” were also created to oversee/run fire, police, waste and (some) transport services across Greater Manchester.

It’s argued that AGMA has been beneficial, giving Greater Manchester a bigger voice, more influence over national and regional policy and more direct control city-wide decisions.

AGMA and the join authorities are not directly accountable to voters.  They have some accountability to councils.

The case for a City Region

The “City Region” is something new from central government.  The idea is to take regionally some of the powers currently held by Government agencies and quangos, in the area of our economic development.

For example, the City Region would control the £600 million annual budget for post-16 education in Greater Manchester, would work to attract investment and boost jobs.

We’re all joined at the hip, the argument goes.  We (the ten Greater Manchester authorities) need to work together more to benefit  us all.

The consultants say there’s no reason for this new “Combined Authority” City Region to cost more  - it’s claimed to be an efficient and effective option.

The alternatives

We’re told that there are two alternatives to this new Combined Authority City Region, covering economic development and transport.

1. Leave AGMA and the joint authorities as they are now, but create a new joint authority for economic development (on top of transport, waste, police & fire).

2. Keep the status quo.

The concerns

Here are some of the concerns that were raised in the briefing session:

• AGMA requires a 7-3 majority vote to take action - meaning that no one political party can force things through on its own.  The new Combined Authority will work on simple majority voting.
• The Combined Authority is not answerable to voters in any way.  If you think they’re doing something wrong, there’s no way you can vote to express that - especially if the leader of your council voted against the decision.  Local Authority councillors can have a degree of oversight.
• It’s much more difficult (and potentially not possible) for local authorities to withdraw from the Combined Authority once they’re in.  In fact, authorities could potentially be forced to join even if they don’t want to.
• The details are vague.  No-one knows exactly what the new body will do, how much money it will cost (or save) and whether it would be better than going it alone.  Lots of time and money has been spent investigating, but we’re still going on educated guesses.
• What if it went in the wrong direction?  Remember the Congestion Charge?  Had a referendum not been forced through, that would have been imposed by a similar body.
• Why bundle in transport (which is something we probably do want to continue being dealt with on a Greater Manchester basis) with the much woolier and less clear-cut economic investment?

This certainly isn’t my area of expertise, so there may be errors and omissions, which I’ll correct whenever they’re spotted.

In the meantime, please have your say.

Martin Lewis, the UK’s best known financial journalist and founder of the Money Saving Expert website, has given the Stockport Boost campaign the big thumbs up.

MoneySavingExpert.com has become one of the UK’s biggest independent financial advice websites with over nine million people visiting it each month. With regular appearances on GMTV and the Tonight programme, Martin Lewis is one of the country’s best known consumer champions offering information and guidance on a wide range of financial issues.

The Money Saving Expert website can be accessed by visiting www.moneysavingexpert.com

Further information on the Stockport Boost campaign is available by logging on to www.stockport.gov.uk/boost (free internet access is available at all Stockport libraries).

Cheadle’s Abney Hall has been a stately home, featured in an Agatha Christie novel, been a town hall, a language school and an office building.  Now its owners, Bruntwood, want it to become an Independent school, and they came along to Thursday’s Cheadle Village Partnership to tell us about it and get some feedback.

So what was the message from Bruntwood?

They were keen to stress that the development protects Abney Hall, that a lot of attention will be paid to avoiding traffic problems, and that users of the park will still be able to walk everywhere they can now.  Whether all of that’s achieved we’ll have to judge when the plans come out.

The plan is for an existing independent primary school with around 300 pupils to move into the Court building behind the main hall.  As those pupils left the primary school,a similar-sized senior school would grow up in the main hall.

There’s a long way to go (not that long, though - the aim is to open the primary school before the end of 2010).  In a straw poll at the Village Partnership meeting, most but not all were positive about the plans, from what we’d heard.

As always with anything that’s likely to come for planning permission, myself and Cllr Paul Porgess (the two councillors present) need to stay neutral and avoid expressing a view for or against.

The Heroes Welcome in Stockport campaign was launched on 11th November 2009 by the Mayor Colin MacAlister.  It aims to encourage local businesses and organisations including retailers to offer discounts to serving armed forces personnel on production of an identification card.

Sounds good to me.  If you’re a business sign up, decide what level of discount you’ll offer, get a sticker to display and (if you wish) go on the national Heroes Welcome in the UK database.

See the leaflet and application form below.

Application form:

Another one where I don’t know the details, but I’ll be interested to find out.

Greater Manchester has been designated the UK’s first Low Carbon Economic Area (LCEA) for the Built Environment the Government announced today. Ministers have been working with environment and economic chiefs in the city region to be named as the UK’s fourth LCEA.

The announcement means that over the next five years Greater Manchester will become a world leader on this agenda and enjoy a range of additional benefits linked to jobs and investment, sharing its expertise throughout the UK and beyond. The Low Carbon Economic Area in Greater Manchester will:

· save 6 million tones of carbon

· create an additional £650 million to the economy

· support 34,800 jobs.

Local businesses joined together with Christmas cheer on Thursday the 26th November, for the Gatley Net Christmas Market organised by local business BOSSco in support of the CLIC Sargent Charity.

14 local businesses snapped up stalls at the Gatley.Net Christmas Market and brought the community, new and unique gifts for Christmas unavailable on the high street such as handcrafted items from Sue Rawlinson, Manchester Uni design students and Former Glory.

Market goers were so positive with comments such as “It’s great that such a variety of stalls have been brought to our village, their are some beautiful gifts”

With over 600 visitors to the market and special guests Batman, Star Wars Storm Trooper and Tusken Raider, the market had a real buzz and Christmas spirit. Children got creative on the Edibles stall designing their own chocolate lollipops and many Christmas shoppers gobbled down delicious delights from Manchester Tarts and local eatery Armenique. Eye catching jewellery from Just So Silver, Posh and Crystal Angels had the ladies in the village filling up their Christmas Lists whilst Lorna Mai had all the pampering goods a girl could wish for.

Picture Left: Hollywood Heroes Storm Trooper and Batman picture with local school children. Picture Right: Manchester Tarts delicious cupcakes tempt shoppers of all ages.

The Market provided great exposure for all the stallholders and showed Gatley some of the exciting new businesses that are being formed in and around Gatley. Stallholders from Gatley included Mooli Mooli, Party Lite and Knitting Nirvana who enjoyed bringing their products to their community in a successful Christmas shopping event that all enjoyed.

Picture Left: Posh bring glamorous costume jewellery to Gatley Net Market. Picture Right: Children personalise their chocolate lollipops on the Edibles stall, with coloured icing.

Many shoppers said how the Christmas Market was a welcomed shopping experience within the village and stall holders too enjoyed the location and event organised by BOSSco “If BOSSco are to do any more markets please let us know as soon as possible, it’s been absolutely great”.

BOSSco said “We are so happy to have held such a successful event that promoted local business, whilst also raising £260 for charity”

From Mark’s website:

Cheadle MP Mark Hunter has launched a new campaign to “save the cheque” after growing concern over news that high street banks are planning to stop the use of cheques.

Yesterday (26 November) Mr Hunter tabled a cross-party Parliamentary motion which, just two hours after calling on other Members to sign it, had collected the signatures of over three dozen MPs including that of Liberal Democrat Shadow Chancellor Vince Cable.

Mark also challenged Leader of the House of Commons, Harriet Harman, at Business Questions yesterday to remind the banks of their role in serving customers, and asked her to hold a debate on the issue.

Commenting, Mark Hunter MP said:

“Abolishing the cheque will cause great inconvenience to many people who rely on cheques as a means of payment - particularly many elderly people.

“This development is most unwelcome in its own right but taken together with the news on bank charges I think they amount to nothing less than a two-fingered gesture to the British public.

“What a way to say thanks after what we’ve done for them!”

The Star Inn on Cheadle High Street is the latest to join our Community Toilet scheme.

Cheadle now has three community toilets: the Star Inn, Cheadle Library and Jackson’s Fish Bar on Ashfield Road.

You can use these as public toilets.

The Community Toilet scheme replaces the old public toilet in Massie Street car park.  Instead of a single cold, often dirty and vandalised toilet, we now have three.

In the run up to Christmas, car parking in Cheadle will be free in Council Pay & Display car parks in Cheadle on:

• Saturday 28th November
• Saturday 5th December
• Saturday 12th December
• Saturday 19th December
• Christmas Day
• Monday 28th December
• New Years Day

This is not just in Cheadle but all the district centres: Romiley, Heaton Moor, Bramhall, Hazel Grove, Cheadle Hulme, Marple, Marple Bridge and Edgeley (excluding Armoury Street).

Gatley, of course, has free parking all the time anyway - just not enough spaces!

There will also be free parking in Stockport Town Centre in the run up to Christmas, but I can’t remember the exact details (I think it’s every Saturday again, but don’t hold me to that).

You might have seen the Stockport Boost campaign the Lib Dem Council have been pushing over the last few months.  There are lots of elements, from attracting big name companies to Stockport - creating hundreds of jobs - to giving communities the ability to improve their shopping areas.

The good news is that, although it’s early days, it seems to be paying off.  Unemployment in Stockport is down for the second month running, and I’m told we’re the only Greater Manchester borough to see unemployment fall.

Two weeks ahead of schedule, Cheadle’s new Tesco Express store is opening tomorrow, Wednesday 18th November.

This is good news - Cheadle has been without a good all-round supermarket for too long.  Thank you to everyone who’s put in a lot of work to make this happen.

I’m running a series of posts to summarise over 400 pages of documents in way that helps those who live and work in Stockport Borough understand the issues we’re facing, the options we have and the Council proposals in how the Borough develops over the next 17 years.

This is the third post.  You can read my overview plus my piece on  the Accessibility Appraisal paper.  This one covers the Core Strategy DPD Preferred Options Consultation, which you can read in full, and comment on, here.

This time I’m trying to condense 140 pages into a few hundred words - wish me luck.

What issues is the strategy trying to tackle?

Although both the population of Stockport Borough and the amount of traffic has fallen slightly in the last few years, we don’t expect that to continue.   The Government is asking Stockport to provide 450 new dwellings (houses or flats) every year - that’s over 7,000 by 2026.

At the same time Stockport, like everywhere, has issues to tackle with how things are now.   We’re the third most polarised borough in the country with pockets of deprivation and much more affluent areas.  Our main roads are congested. Stockport Town Centre isn’t all it could be.  Lots of people live in the Borough and travel out for work, with lots more living outside and travelling in.  And, in common with most other areas, we have an aging population and a lack of affordable housing.

The general approach

So we expect to have thousands of new flats and houses, which means (over time), more shops, offices, schools, sport, leisure, culture and health facilities and cemetaries.  Where should they all go?

This was the subject of a previous consultation.  Different options were looked at and the conclusion was, in the main, to strengthen existing centres.  By far the most development is planned for Stockport Town Centre.  Another big chunk goes into the District Centres and the Large Local Centres, with a smaller amount elsewhere.

Stockport has 8 District Centres: Cheadle, Cheadle Hulme, Bramhall, Edgeley, Hazel Grove, Marple, Reddish and Romiley.  It has 10 Large Local Centres: Gatley, Heald Green, Moor Top, Heaton Moor, Shaw Road/Heaton Moor Road, Heaton Chapel, Davenport, Great Moor, North Reddish and Marple Bridge.

Housing

There’s more to this than just building lots of houses and flats.  How big should they be?  How expensive?  Where should they go?

The proposal in this strategy paper is

• a 50/50 split between houses and flats overall, with most flats going in the Town Centre (which will end up with a much higher population) and most houses going around the District and Large Local Centres.
• The majority of the flats to have two bedrooms.
• 40% of new housing to be affordable for those on lower incomes.
• 80% of new housing to be in existing buildings and previously developed land.
• More social rented housing for Bramhall, Cheadle Hulme, Cheadle, Edgeley, Davenport, Marple, Romiley and the Heatons.
• If Woodford Aerodrome becomes vacant, using it wholly or partially for housing is one of several options.
• Stockport currently has no formal Gypsy and Traveller pitches.  Following Government guidance, we are expected to create 35, plus another ten travelling showpeople pitches.  This should increase to 57 pitches in total by 2026 and they should be be in urban areas with good access to services.
• 50% of the new dwellings to be in the Central Housing Area, with up to 2,000 in the Town Centre (the Central Housing Area is the Town Centre plus some areas around it).
• A further 35% of new dwellings to be within walking distance of District and Large Local centres.
• 15% of dwellings to be built elsewhere.

Reducing the size of some struggling centres

Even in the recession, most of our District and Local Centres are doing OK, including Cheadle, Gatley, Bramhall and Heald Green.  Walk around them and you won’t see many empty units.

Some are suffering more, including Hazel Grove and Edgeley.  For these, one option is to reduce the size of the centres - for example, by turning retail units at the edges of the centres into residential properties.

For all centres, the paper also offers the option of limiting the number of hot food and fast food outlets either within a centre altogether or near to schools and play areas.

Cemetaries

It may not be something most of us give much thought to, but Stockport’s cemetaries will be full in 10-15 years.  Should we create new cemetaries (if so, where?) or re-use existing ones.

Strengthen District and Local Centres

The overall strategy is to maintain and enhance the Town Centre along with existing District and Local Centres.

Here, I confess, I don’t think the document is very clear (and, in one case, makes a fairly blatant mistake).  The section in question is 7.135 on page 70.  It refers to changes in planning policies.

The paper proposes  controlling the scale, clustering and mix of uses in Centres to meet local needs and enhance the viability of the Centres.  Great in principle, and fine if there are lots of retailers and developers with different schemes.  The problem comes when the commercial environment isn’t quite so strong.

You might want to have a retail outlet in a particular place, but if no retailers want to open there, your real choice might be something else (a take-away, for example) or nothing. It could well be that nothing - an empty unit - is the best choice in some cases, but we should be aware of the issue.

With that in mind, I’m not clear exactly what the paper’s proposing.

Outside Local and District Centres, the paper proposes that we permit a change of use from service to non-service (e.g. offices or residential) unless there’s a good reason not to, as part of the strategy to strengthen the Centres.

In Large Local Centres, the paper says we should restrict the size of new shops and leisure units (where not re-using an existing building) to a maximum of  500 square metres (and 250 square metres in other Local Centres).  For District Centres, the much higher limit of 25,000 square metres is proposed.  (I think incorrect wording results in this paragraph actually saying the opposite of this).

There’s also a sentence which, I think, suggests that a new small convenience store would not be permitted if other local retailers already provide the same services.

Requiring that new convenience shops meeting local needs (up to max 250 square metres) will only be allowed where there are no alternative sustainably accessible facilities.

Again, it not necessarily a problem; but I don’t understand why we’d want to single out convenience shops.  If we’re going to protect that one type of shop from competition, why not protect newsagents, cafes or hairdressers?

Building business

The plan identifies the need to build strong business centres around Stockport, and argues that this should be primarily achieved by enhancing and promoting the Town Centre for new office development.  That fits in with the principle of enhancing the Town Centre overall, and concentrates more traffic flows into the centre (which is the location best served by public transport and car parking).

In particular, the strategy is to attract ICT, digital, creative and new media companies into offices around the A6 south of the M60 - especially in the civic quarter.

There’s also strong office provision in some our District and Local Centres: Bramhall, Cheadle, Cheadle Hulme, Hazel Grove, Stepping Hill and Gatley.  These should be supported.

Heavier industry should have direct access to main access routes (e.g. motorways) without having to go through residential areas.  The Bredbury Industrial Area is given as an example of a location that fits the bill.

The report says that there’s no specific need to find new areas of employment close to deprived areas: either they are there already, or there are good public transport links from those areas to the Town Centre.

Sport, green spaces and leisure

Stockport has an oversupply of senior sports pitches (compared to the Government recommendation for how many we should have) but slightly too few mini soccer facilities.

The report also identifies a shortfall of leisure facilities in the Town Centre, Hazel Grove, Reddish, Romiley and Edgeley, with too few sports halls (relative to the population) in the north and north east of the Borough.

There’s a discussion about our green spaces, both “formal open space” - parks and similar - and other green spaces.

Should we continue the current strategy of retaining a semi-rural character for our river valleys; or should we use that space to meet more formal needs, for example by building sports pitches there?

Overall, though the Cheadle area (Cheadle, Gatley, Heald Green and the northern part of Cheadle Hulme) was identified as having more than enough formal open space (again, compared to Government recommendations), the Borough as a whole falls 105 hectares short.  The Heatons also do well for green space, with Victoria, Tame Valley and Werneth needing improvement.

The plan rejects giving absolute protection to current green space.  It gives the example of the Cheadle Committee area, where there’s lots of formal green space and a shortage of affordable housing.  It suggests the option to swap some should be left open.

Transport

The strategy paper advocates more people living, working and playing in Stockport Town Centre along with our District and Local Centres.  If that’s going to be successful, we need to be able to get to and from those places.

Issues identified include:

• a lack of orbital train links from Stockport to Manchester Airport and Tameside
• a lack of train links between Stockport and some District Centres (Marple, Cheadle) and a general weakness in public transport between Marple and Stockport
• congestion across many of the Borough’s main roads

It notes that there are plans currently in place to improve transport provision, including SEMMMS, aiming to deliver the extended A555 Relief Road by 2016 and rail improvements scheduled to start from 2014.

Other reports and plans are noted including the 2009-2015 Stockport Cycling Strategy,  the Greater Manchester Integration Transport Strategy (GMITS) and the South Pennines Integrated Transport Strategy (SPITS).

Beyond those (which I won’t cover here, but will do at some stage if I have the time), the paper comes up with a selection of ideas that fall some way short of firm proposals:

• we need to shift from single-occupancy car use to more car sharing, cycling,  walking and public transport.
• promote flexible working and home working
• introduce more 20mph zones in residential areas
• improve the network of walking and cycling routes, both direct (normally on-road) and off-road for recreational and less confident cyclists.

Disclaimer

In this post I’ve attempted to summarise Stockport Council’s Core Strategy Development Plan Document (DPD) consultation paper.  This is my own work; it is not an official Council or Liberal Democrat summary and I’d be frankly amazed if there weren’t significant omissions and mistakes.   Nothing in this summary should be taken as indicating either my or the Liberal Democrats’ support for, or agreement with, the strategy paper.

The Accessibility Appraisal Consultation Paper is part of Stockport Council’s Core Strategy - how the borough needs to develop over the next 15-20 years.  The document is being consulted on and you have until 25th November to give your opinions.

This is my summary of that paper.  Since the full document is 82 pages, you can take it as read that things are missed out.  Also, this is purely from me reading the document - which you can do too.  I’ve no extra information and I may have made mistakes.  With that in mind, let’s press on.

What’s the purpose of the Accessibility Appraisal? 

We should start off by being clear about what the document is and isn’t trying to achieve.  It doesn’t lay out proposals for what should be done in Stockport.  You won’t find plans to improve a certain bus service, build new housing in a certain area or create a new retail park.

Rather, it attempts to set the scene, to provide the basis for making those proposals, to define the problems that we need to solve and the challenges we need to meet.  Not quite as exciting, but very important.  If you’re not asking the right questions, your chance of coming up with the right answers is pretty low.

What is accessibility?

For this study, “accessibility” is simply how easy it is for people to get to everywhere they need to: their jobs, shops, schools, medical centres, hospitals, pubs, restaurants, leisure facilities, parks and community facilities.

You may reach them by car; but not everyone has a car and, even for those who do, it’s not much good saying the shop’s just down the road if you have to sit in a traffic jam for an hour to get there.  You might also get to them by train, bus, bike or on foot.

The Government is asking for over 7,500 new dwellings to be built in Stockport over the next 17 years, meaning more people and more traffic.

A big part of our challenge is to figure out how to organise that so we get the extra flats and houses in the right places and keep (and improve) this accessibility, for both new and existing residents.

Dealing with inequality

Stockport has relatively high inequality, both between areas in the borough (e.g. compare Brinnington and Bramhall) and within areas (e.g. older people).  It’s very important we provide access for all, not just the wealthier in our community.  We also need to recognise that more deprived areas have different problems, such as poorer health and higher unemployment.

Two examples

Let’s suppose we look at a relatively poor area, and we think it might be a good place to build additional low cost housing too.  So we can predict we’ll have a population who not only need all the usual services and facilities like shops and parks, but will have a higher need for healthcare and certain sorts of jobs.  Additionally, they are less likely to have cars.

For an area like this, it will be very important to ensure safe and reasonably fast access to healthcare, shops, workplaces, entertainment and the rest of it by public transport, walking and cycling.

Alternatively, we can look at a wealthier area with high car ownership.  In this case, it might be more important to look at congestion, to predict where new pinch points in the  road network will emerge and tackle those (for example, through the SEMMMS strategy).

 So what are the problems?

The paper is the result of a big study that looked across the borough, worked out how good access was to all the different services in each place and mapped it.  That was also compared to areas of low car ownership and poor health.

Overall, the picture is clear.  Those of us in the centre, north and north west of the borough have - by and large - the best access to all the different services.  That’s areas like the Town Centre, Cheadle, Gatley, the Heatons, Reddish, Cheadle Hulme and out to Hazel Grove.

Those in the south and east of the borough have the poorest access to services: Bramhall (outside the village centre), Woodford, Romiley, Marple, Bredbury and Offerton, for example.

That’s not necessarily a problem right now: plenty of people choose to live somewhere more rural and happily trade-off being a bit further from the shops against living in their preferred location.

It is a problem, however, where you have a population with poor health and low car ownership who also have poor access to services; or where the roads are getting so congested that drivers can’t get to where they want to go.

So, for example, the study identifies a lack of links from Marple to Stockport Town Centre and congestion around Bramhall Moor as serious issues.  It also expresses concern about the lack of access to services in places like Bredbury Green, Cherry Tree Lane (Romiley) and Marple South (especially Hawk Green).

And to absolutely no-one’s surprise, the study idenfies congestion issues on most of the main roads around the borough.

What’s to be done?

As I said before, this report is about identifying the questions, with the answers still to come, and that’s an important thing to get right.  However, we do get a sniff of what some of the answers might look like.

The study suggests better promoting the Town Centre as  an evening destination.  That means not only having the restaurants, pubs, clubs, cinemas, theatres and the like, but also public transport links that run late into the night.

It also talks about promoting mixed developments (where you have housing, workplaces and other services all in the same area) and more “employment sites” around the borough.  The aim is to reduce the distances people need to travel, which would reduce congestion, not to mention making our lives more pleasant.

For example, the report idenfies Cheadle Royal and Woodford as two such centres, but warns that public transport access to both are currently poor and would need to be improved.

What’s there to consult on?

So far I’ve tried to summarise the content of the report.  This is a consultation and the paper says

Comments are invited on the proposed approach. By way of guidance comments would be welcome in relation to the following questions:
1. Do you agree with the principles behind the approach?
2. Do you think the process is sufficiently transparent to use as a basis for accessibility policies?
3. Do you agree with the emphasis of the approach on public choice rather than just achieving a minimum accessibility standard?
4. Would you like to see this approach applied in support other areas of policy development (such as in education or health service provision)?

What might you say?  You might think the report is about right - if so, it’s worth saying it.  If nothing else, it’ll give the people who wrote it a bit more job satisfaction!

Do you agree that accessibility is the right thing to focus on?  As we look forwards over the next two decades, should we be spending time, money and energy on minimising the travel time for people to get to where they want to go; or is that the wrong goal?

You might feel that it hasn’t got the measures right when looking at accessibility.  As the report admits, it doesn’t identify pinch points in the transport network, nor does it take into account off-road transport routes such as footpaths and cycle paths.

Perhaps you disagree with the idea of trying to bring our jobs closer to our homes and feel that a better solution would be to build a transport network to shuttle people as quickly as possible to Manchester, Liverpool, Sheffield, Leeds and elsewhere to give Stockport residents the widest catchment area for jobs.

Question 3 links into ideas of what the Local Authority - and its partners - are there for.  Is it the job of the public sector to make our transport network as good as it can be, or should we be doing much less (and so needing less money to do it, perhaps resulting in lower Council Tax).

Until 25th November, you can visit the Council’s consultation portal, read the documents, register online and submit comments.  You can also submit your comments by email to planning.policy@stockport.gov.uk.

Disclaimer

In this post I’ve attempted to summarise Stockport Council’s Accessibility Appraisal Consultation Paper. This is my own work; it is not an official Council or Liberal Democrat summary and I’d be frankly amazed if there weren’t significant omissions and mistakes. Nothing in this summary should be taken as indicating either my or the Liberal Democrats’ support for, or agreement with, the strategy paper.

Most of the things I get involved with are pretty immediate.  Problems that need fixing as soon as possible, or at most issues like the Kingsway filter that might take a couple of years to sort out.

So thinking about how I see Stockport developing up to 2026 requires a bit of a shift in focus.

That’s the idea behind Stockport Council’s Core Strategy.  Some progress has been made on this and the latest stage is now open for consultation until 25th November.

The issues aren’t simple.

Like everywhere else in the country, Stockport needs to provide new housing (at least 450 dwellings a year - nearly 8,000 by 2026.  That’s a whole Cheadle & Gatley and a bit more besides (we have about 6,500 dwellings in the ward).

What should the mix of housing be?  Where should it be located?  How many flats?  How much social housing?

How do we build the economic future of the borough, providing jobs, education and training for current and future residents?

What needs to be done to attract more people into the Town Centre along with our local and district centres (Cheadle is a district centre, Gatley is a local centre).  How do we ensure not only vibrant retail centres but also the best access for all to leisure, culture, education, health, open space and other community facilities.

How do we protect our open spaces, greenbelt land and heritage?

Stockport is already congested, so how can we get everyone moving even with thousands of extra homes?  What mix of buses, trains, facilities for cyclists and pedestrians and, of course, private car travel is right?

For the next month, you can visit the Council’s consultation portal, read the documents, register online and submit comments.  You can also submit your comments by email to planning.policy@stockport.gov.uk.

The actual consultation documents are fairly involved - together there’s several hundred pages.

So, to get more people involved, I’m currently reading and summarising the different documents - hopefully in a way that draws out the key questions and issues.

First there’s the Accessibility Appraisal.  That document sets the scene - it’s more about defining the issues than coming up with solutions.  It looks at how easy or difficult it is for people to get to where they want to go - to access schools, shops, jobs, leisure and healthcare, for example.

Next is the Core Strategy Consulation, which looks forward over the next 17 years with proposals covering housing, jobs, green spaces, sport and leisure, transport and more.

The other three papers, which I haven’t summarised yet are:

• Core Strategy DPD: Preferred Options - Habitats Regulations Assessment Screening Report
• Core Strategy DPD: Preferred Options - Sustainability Appraisal Screening Report
• Core Strategy DPD: Preferred Options - Sustainability Appraisal Screening Report Annexes

Come along to the sixth annual Fairtrade Fair at Stockport College, 10.30am - 3.30pm Saturday November 14th at Stockport College on the A6.

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