Sally Allen: Strand project looks nice - but will it bring Torquay back to life?

I have now seen the plans for the Strand Harbour project and understand that work will start next week. Well obviously, I am delighted that something is now going to happen. I just don’t believe that it is the most important or critical thing that the Council can do to stimulate our town. This particular project is certainly not going to bring Torquay back to life in isolation, and let’s face it, at the moment it is on life support and not looking too good!
I realise that a lot of people won’t agree with me, but I see this harbourside development more as a vanity project rather than a vital injection of adrenaline into the sad looking patient called Torquay.
Surely it would be quicker, more productive and no doubt cheaper to stimulate the town by opening it up to traffic. Yes, that’s right; go back to basics! The town is currently in two very sad halves. If the traffic could travel in a one-way system from Castle Circus down to the harbour with vital street parking all the way down, people would be encouraged to shop. However, the naturally increased footfall would benefit business owners only if business rates were slashed and new traders encouraged with advantageous deals.
It is a well-known fact that footfall only increases when you can park close by, and by that, I mean as close to outside where you want to go as possible. It is impossible for the elderly, disabled and mothers with pushchairs and young children to shop in town. The parking is either derisory, downright dangerous or a long way away for most people to walk. There is also not nearly enough of it. Torquay has even reduced parking by building another hotel without sufficient parking for their own guests, let alone those from the Hampton Hilton. So, shoppers as normal get the short straw – and yet the powers that be are still amazed that retail is dead in the town. And for the record, it is not all the fault of Internet shopping. Personally, I never ever go into the town unless I absolutely have to. I avoid it at all costs. It is beyond depressing plus it has no decent shops and yet, I would love to go shopping and have lunch in town with my friends if there were nice places to visit and it was easy to park.
Ergo councillors; what are you doing to encourage shoppers into the town? Zippo from what I can see. To encourage retailers to make a financial commitment they need to know that people will see, sample and buy their products or services. To make that more likely, people driving by their establishments would help enormously.
The UK has tried to copy the big malls in the USA but over there they have a huge amount of land to build on and planners keen to accommodate development. So, they have massive football pitch size parking for shoppers plus you can normally drive into parking spaces (yes, my old hobby horse – echelon parking!) outside the shops. Everything is done for the ease and comfort of the shopper. The Americans love commerce and understand how to make it work, so they go out of their way to make it easy to make money! Over here, it is an assault course. The customer needs to be the priority in any Councils’ thoughts when laying out a town plan. It rarely, if ever, is.
The Strand Harbour plan, therefore, in my opinion, might look nice but it is not going to solve any of the problems in rejuvenating the town. The money could be spent so much better. I also hope that this time there are penalty clauses in place for timing, non-performance et al with Montel Civil Engineering and that there will be no wriggling out halfway through the project!
In addition, while we are on the subject of bringing people into the town to spend their cash, money would be better spent on our two potentially money-making, tourist attracting historic gems, The Pavilion and Oldway Mansion, ensuring the building of a much needed 5-star Palace Hotel and sorting out the vast number of potholes which make us look like a third world shanty town. Torbay has suffered enough white elephants and bad Council decisions over the years i.e. tearing down the Marine Spa and building the horrendous Coral Island, building a conference centre not big enough for the really lucrative conferences, Fleet Walk; the bad calls are endless. I could go on and on but will go for a lie down instead.