Three projects to revitalise Swindon town centre will start EARLIER than expected
But Robert Buckland wants to see progress even faster
Last updated 1st Jun 2021
Three projects to revitalise the town centre funded by the £20m grant to Swindon Borough Council from the government’s Towns Fund will be fast tracked to allow work to start later this financial year.
But South Swindon MP Robert Buckland wants to see progress even faster.
Council officer David Dewart told the latest meeting of the Towns Fund Board that three of the seven projects to be funded could be brought forward quicker.
He said: “One of the projects is the work on the Sheppard Street pedestrian underpass, and the Bristol Street tunnel and enhancements to Station Road, and it’s the work on Station Road we want to fast track.
“One of the projects is work on renovating a unit in the Great Western Railways Carriage Works for Create Studios, and the third is the work on the town centre market. If all goes well with the alternative property owner we can bring the town centre market project forward."
Mr Dewart said business cases would be made on these three items by the end of summer or early autumn to allow actual construction work to begin by the end of the financial year in March 2022.
The council is looking for a new site in which to put a new market in the town centre. Originally the plan was to use some of the Brunel centre – but owner of the centre FI Real Estate said it was not progressing with a market site on their land and was concentrating on post-Covid 19 recovery.
Mr Dewart confirmed that the withdrawal of the site offered at the Brunel did not affect the funding of the council’s projects.
Robert Buckland told the meeting he wanted to see things changing quicker than that.
He said: “We talk about fast-tracking but saying something will happen in 2022 isn’t really fast-tracking.
“This is early on, so we are necessarily talking about processes and compliance, but people will soon be asking what’s happening with these and we don’t yet have a story to tell them, so I’d really like to see how we can bring something substantial forward even quicker.
“I want to see us keep up the momentum after the excellent work on securing the funding.”
The three projects to be fast-tracked are some of the cheaper plans put forward for funding, with the town market costing £250,000, the work for Create Studio £1m and the Station Road work anticipated to take £1.5m of the government’s funding.
Other projects to be funding under the Towns Fund scheme include major refurbishment of the Health Hydro, further renovation of the Carriage Works and work on the Kimmerfields development.