Email To Public Places in the Heart of Todmorden Project Team at Calderdale Council – Jan 2024

 

Hi Project Team,

Thank you for staging the meeting etc etc

Since last week’s meeting, I’ve had some time to think things through a bit more and had more of a focused walk and look around the site at the weekend.

I will highlight my thoughts at future meetings and to other stakeholders as I meet with them but I thought it wouldn’t do any harm to mention them here at this time in the process.

I’m sure I won’t be the only one to realise this but, on visiting and physically pacing out the hardstanding area to the right of the site (where the Enterprise Centre was originally planned), I worked out that this could almost certainly accommodate around 60 car park spaces. Four rows of 15 vehicles, 1 either side of the site running perpendicular to the river and a double row in the middle.

I counted 59 car parking spaces in the main section of parking within Bramsche Square so effectively this car parking could be moved here and we could have the best of BOTH worlds.

We can still have the open Civic Square that many people (including myself) would love to have in this central space in the heart of Todmorden – without sacrificing any parking whatsoever. (Which again I favour myself).

This may be a slightly simplistic view but if you can take the contentious parking issue out of the equation then surely this would make the project more palatable to the majority of stakeholders and the public. A genuine – and very rare – Win/Win situation for everyone.

 

The View on Reducing Parking to Encourage More People to Use Public or Greener Methods of Transport

I understand this point of view, I really do, I can’t say I’m happy about the volume of vehicles on our three main roads into the town. However, 90% of these are not coming TO Todmorden, they’re coming THROUGH Todmorden and reducing car parking places would NOT alleviate this.

I’m not advocating creating any more parking spaces, just not losing any as the vast majority of town centre-based businesses are campaigning for. This is despite my hope and belief that the town will attract more visitors once these regeneration projects have been completed.

Putting aside visitors for one moment, we also have to consider the everyday population of the town, which is much more geographically spread than many towns.

A large number of residents live in areas not within a realistic walking distance of the centre and shops. Walsden, Cornholme, Portsmouth, Havelin Park, Eastwood, Lumbutts – and spread out on the surrounding hills – where a car offers the only real means of getting out of their neighbourhoods and into the town.

Public bus services have only got worse/less frequent in the last 5 years and, to put it mildly, there is no great indication right now that they are likely to improve in the next 5, 10, 15 years time. I do hope they will though and that people are provided with a carrot rather than a stick to make a change in their travel habits.

Finally, and back to design, personally I really like the stone setts that were laid on Bridge Street, Calder Street & the top part of School Street in 2022. Even if prohibitively expensive or not suitable for the square area itself, I think it would be great to extend this to what are the current roads around Bramsche Square and its boundary points to tie this whole area from the town hall and market in together.

The points above are in the main my own personal views but those on protecting parking provision in the heart of the town – and for the market in particular – reflect those I’ve heard directly from the majority of businesses in the town centre over the last couple of years.

Thanks again for organising the meeting(s) and I look forward to seeing you soon.

All the best,

Alan