Festive Fun Day in Bishop’s Stortford town centre on Sunday November 17
Bishop’s Stortford Business Improvement District (BID) joint-manager Karen Burton writes for the Indie
As a Business Improvement District (BID), our mandate is to deliver our 2023-28 business plan. This plan has four key elements: marketing and promotion, events, supporting businesses and, introduced for this, our second term, a concept called place making.
It sounds like one of those fancy terms that needs a bit of explanation, so here goes. Place making is all about how our public spaces look and feel. Are they clean and welcoming and feel like each area connects with the next? Are there places where you’d want to sit and relax? And, from a town centre perspective, is it somewhere you’d happily go to and recommend?
For us, place making must consider the needs of local businesses. After all, they’re the ones who vote us in and who we represent. You could think of a BID as a kind of town councillor, except we advocate for businesses rather than residents. This dynamic is important because we strive to work alongside decision-makers wherever possible, including town, district and county councils, and highlight vital information they need to build a healthier local economy.
Over the past six months, we’ve been looking at ways to apply these place making principles to the north end of town, creating a vision of what could be achieved. That work and conversations are ongoing.
Now it’s time to consider South Street, Potter Street and Market Square - an area with different characteristics and challenges compared to North Street. Here, footfall is much stronger, empty units are scarce and there’s a healthy mix of retail and hospitality.
Recently, Madeleine, my fellow joint-manager, and I joined a walkabout to look at this area with town councillors, their CEO and two officers from Hertfordshire County Council. Taking the time to stop and look rather than passing through was an eye-opener. Suddenly you are aware of the sheer amount of through traffic, crowded pavements and the cluttered mess of street furniture, ageing bins and under-used bike racks.
There were various viewpoints, but we all agreed that discouraging through traffic could be a first step forward. Honestly, I lost count of the lorries that rumbled by at the Potter Street and Bridge Street junction, clearly using our town centre as a shortcut!
We also explored the idea of creating a traffic-free zone at weekends. The area we looked at runs from the Church Street junction up to Bridge Street - basically the same stretch we’ll be closing for Festive Fun Day on Sunday November 17 from midday to 4pm. This gives an excellent opportunity for us to trial what a pedestrian-priority area might look like in that part of town.
Just like we did with Showtime on North Street, we’ll work with businesses to understand the pros and cons of a future part-time closure of this part of the town centre and gather feedback on traffic and accessibility for all. We’ll share any insights we gather on the day of the event with key stakeholders, including Hertfordshire County Council, as we continue towards our place making goals.
As for the event, we will be providing entertainment and atmosphere and the businesses will be showcasing everything our high street has to offer. So we hope to see you at Festive Fun Day and we welcome any questions, suggestions or feedback.
What do you think about making parts of the town centre more pedestrian-friendly? Let’s start the conversation!