Bedford’s mayor has said the purchase of the Lloyds Bank building on Bedford’s High Street is part of his election pledge to make the town centre a place where “people want to shop, live, work and socialise”.
Mayor, Tom Wootton, told the Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS): “It’s the council that has the belief in their town – nobody else is going to big Bedford up if we don’t. We think Bedford is a town on the up.”
The purchase comes after the council recently bought the former Debenhams building
Read: Former Debenhams ‘open for business’ as ground floor available for rent
The portfolio holder for economic growth, planning and prosperity, cllr Andrea Spice (Conservative, Wixams and Wilstead) said: “I truly believe that this huge redevelopment will help residents to be proud of their town.
“They’ll want to come and they’ll want to explore it, there will be more options, there will be more things to do. We’re trying to get people to come into town, stay a bit longer, explore a bit more, go find something that you haven’t found.
“But they’ll only do that for so long, we need to keep filling it and adding new things. Some people think that Bedford has been forgotten, or it’s too tired, or it’s not got what they want.
“So we’re trying to bring that all together to make something that people want.”
The council may well have the work cut out after recently withdrawing support for Bedford BID, the organisation set up to help promote Bedford Town Centre and its businesses.
Promoting Bedford
Earlier this year, the council said the BID lacked “ambition for revitalising the town centre” and that its proposals for renewal did support the town’s “large number of smaller, independent businesses”, as well as concerns for the way BID was managed and run.
Read: Bedford Borough Council confirms it will vote against BedfordBID renewal
This led to several other businesses losing faith in them and voting against their renewal.
Read: BedfordBID voted out after businesses lose faith in their plans for town centre
With BID now gone, local business campaigners have raised concerns the Council may not be able to deliver what is needed to help Bedford town centre thrive.
Tim Edwards, who led the Better BID for Bedford campaign has called on the council to ‘step up’ ahead of the end of BedfordBID’s current term so town centre businesses are still treated as a priority.
“In the coming months I hope the Council and businesses will be able to work together to assess what real value the BID was offering and ensure that the services that businesses need are continued,” he said.
Bigger picture
Cllr Spice says the recent purchases, despite concerns about the council borrowing money to buy up property, show that they are looking at “the bigger picture”.
“Don’t look at each individual thing, we need to look at the vision of what we’re trying to do to transform our town centre. For our residents, for our visitors, for our business and investors, for everybody, ” she said.
“We want a town centre that everybody is proud of and they think, ‘gosh, you know what, I’m going to go to Bedford, because they’ve got everything there that I could need.
“But looking at each thing individually it’s hard to see it. You need to look at the bigger picture of what we’re trying to achieve.”
Deputy mayor, cllr Jim Weir (Conservative, Great Denham) said that while the detractors may be focussing on the borrowing, the council is getting money to invest in the future development of the town.
“We’ve just had a return visit for a peer review from the Local Government Association, and they said quite categorically, you have to invest to move any town forward,” he said.
“And what we’re doing seems to be the right thing,” he said.
Mayor Wootton added: “It’s quite exciting when you look at it. This is a council that really believes in its own town centre, it’s going to big the town up and have real pride in Bedford.
“I think we’ve got a very good chance of doing something quite impressive here.”
By John Guinn
Local Democracy Reporter
Additional reporting by
Paul Hutchinson, Bedford Independent
