Doughnut loses its jam

OUT-OF-TOWN shopping parks are destroying Swindon town centre, according to the man charged with revitalising it.

Peter Andrews, chief executive of The New Swindon Company, says that developments such as West Swindon Shopping Centre, Greenbridge Retail Park and the Designer Outlet Village are killing diversity and sucking business out of the heart of the town.

In a remarkably frank assessment of the state of Swindon town centre, he says: "It's not performing its true role as a sub-regional centre.

"It has been losing employment while the rest of Swindon has been gaining employment, it lacks shops from the high end of the market, and it is not a focus for cultural and leisure activity."

Mr Andrews blames a lack of investment and points a finger at the out-of-town shopping developments.

"Very little has been spent in the town centre on improving the public realm," he says.

"And what has impacted on Swindon town particularly is the growth of out-of-town centres.

"It's too late to reverse their influence the toothpaste is out of the tube and we can't put it back."

It is a bleak diagnosis, but Mr Andrews says that changes to planning law have curtailed further developments, suggesting that things should not, at least, get any worse than they are already.

Mayor Derek Benfield (Lab, Covingham and Nythe) echoes many of his concerns, and says more needs to be done to protect Swindon from what he calls the "doughnut effect", where businesses move to the outskirts leaving an empty hole in the middle.

"Shopping has always been in the town but planning guidance doesn't allow us to protect it to the extent we would like," he says.

"Local shops are an important part of a community."

Mayor Benfield is particularly concerned about preventing a new out-of-town store grabbing land alongside homes planned for the Front Garden between Okus and the M4, which he says could be lethal to Old Town as well as a further nail in the coffin of town centre shopping.

Jean Saunders of Swindon Friends of the Earth accuses out-of-town developments of encouraging people to use their cars.

"The car parks are always free and the land taken up by parking is enormous," she says.

Mrs Saunders believes large superstores should be made to pay tax on parking spaces in addition to the rates they pay for retail space.

If the costs were passed on to customers it would even up the playing field, currently tilted to the advantage of those able to offer free parking, she says.

"In supporting supermarkets and out-of-town developments, shoppers are ringing the death knell for local shops," she warns.

But Julian Leggett, centre manager of West Swindon Shopping Centre, says that out-of-town developments should not be blamed for the shortcomings of the town centre."It's the town centre's fault," he says.

"Swindon doesn't have the town centre it deserves and it's up to the centre to pull in the shops we need."

Mr Leggett, who counts increasing numbers of customers passing through his doors, says people come to West Swindon Shopping Centre because it is convenient.

"We have 960 free car parking spaces and they are all on the same level," he says.

"We have 27 shops, takeaways, bookies and banks and they are easy to get to. Although we were built primarily to service residents of the West Swindon expansion, we pull people in from all over the place, including the town centre.

"In fact we are more or less a small town centre in our own right."

It is not just the out-of-towners who say the centre should do more for itself.

The New Swindon Company understands the town's shortcomings cannot be blamed entirely on the superstores.

The centre is also competing for customers with nearby town centres such as Bath and Oxford, which suck shoppers out of Swindon.

Mr Andrews says he recognises the huge challenge facing the town centre.

But the positive news is retail spending is still growing and so is the population of Swindon.

Many more shops look likely to come to the town centre.

Westfield Shoppingtowns, which owns the Brunel Centre, has already announced plans for 30,000 sq m of new shopping space including a cinema and department store, expected to open by 2008.

Retail capacity studies show there is space for an additional 20,000sq m by 2011, and possibly a further 50,000sq m by 2016.

"We want the town centre to be the primary shopping centre for Swindon," says Mr Andrews.

"The centre has the potential to provide a much bigger variety of shops than the out-of-town developments, including high fashion and small independent retailers.

"Our job is to encourage retailers to set up shop here and we are trying to put together major projects to enable us to get a step change in the centre."

But there are no plans to make car parking free.

"Our prices are not out of line with other towns," says Mr Andrews.

"People will pay to park if they think they are getting something they can't get elsewhere."

Andy Tate