Town centre Living..is it the answer

[fatfrog]

I have seen a couple of comments regarding this subject and so thought it would make an interesting thread of its own.

I have thought for some time that the town centre could be revived if some of the suitable commercial buildings could be used for town centre living. What is your opion?

 

[My Name is URL]

Another solution would be to prioritise, and perhaps even incentivise, planning permission for "no car" housing developments (within a certain distance of the town centre)....

E.g. the new houses up towards doxey, the planned houses for the Castleworks site, the planned(?) Burleyfields development, even Castlefields, if thought in advance would have been ideal for it.

Think about it, developments where houses do not come with any parking spaces, where covenants on the house owners prohibit them from owning cars, where there are no roads on the development.... easy walking distance for the town centre, combined with bus access for those with mobility difficulties, cycle routes....

People would NEED to walk, cycle or use public transport.... They would also mean people need to work locally or somewhere reasonably accessible by public transport.... Worst case scenario, you could even have (for example) 5 car parking spaces specifically for commercially run car pool cars where residents can access them for a set price per hour if they really need occasional access to a car.

These places would be much nicer environments to live with no chavs boy racing around, safer for kids to play knowing they couldn't get run over, no unsightly commercial vehicles and caravans blocking neighbours windows.....

Question is, could it ever happen.... I suppose in theory there is no reason why not. In reality though the builders will only build them like that if a) they can sell them and b) for as much or more than they could normal houses...

 

[52.8N-2.1W]

Another solution would be to prioritise, and perhaps even incentivise, planning permission for "no car" housing developments (within a certain distance of the town centre)....

Whilst a nice idea in theory, "no car" developments are a recipe for disaster. It does not stop people with cars buying them, or moving in as tenants, just as advertising a property to let as "No Smoking" does not stop smokers moving in and then hanging out of a window to smoke. They'll just park their cars as close as possible creating chaos in neighbouring areas.

I lived for several years in one of those identikit new developments of 2 bedroom apartments that sprang up all over the country during the property boom prior to 2007. Each apartment comes with one allocated parking space. They were marketed to "young professional couples". Each "young professional couple" comes with 2 cars. Total chaos.

 

[52.8N-2.1W]

...dupe...

 

[Wormella]

I think it depends on the couple, of family, and what they need - when we lived in Liverpool, we lived in the business district - on the edge of what was considered at the time 'city center living' - which meant we walked everywhere - or used public transport - and although we had a parking space, and for a while, a camper van to fill it - because everything was so close (I had a 30 min walk to where I studied my Masters, and we both had a 15 min walk to our job) and everything else was in easy distance - apart from things like big supermarkets etc - which meant the cost of eating was quite high if you didn't want to live off ready meals or takeaways.

What we did enjoy was having easy access to pubs etc - and being able to get rid of a car - and the financial and ecological benefits that go with that.

However when we moved here, some circumstances changed and for work - and then play (you try dragging a P.A. system around) and we needed a car - however we still wanted to be in the walking distance of town for work, and both our jobs - and we choose where we lived accordingly. I think choice is the key word - if you choose to live somewhere, town, village etc, then you have to accept good and bad aspects of that - I don't think forcing people will work - because the rest of society isn't going to work that way - unless they are nudged, or they can see the specific benifits.

What would help, without a doubt is comprehensive reasonably priced public transport - not something that costs £2 to get from John Street, just of Corporation Rd to the center of town on the bus....

 

[loveatfirstbite]

i wonder whether the council could have incentives by having a years parking on the long stay council car parks? i know you can get a years pass, maybe it could be included with a years rent? ive said before, theres a perfect little town in switzerland where i went to look at a bakery (and eat sour cake, omg it was worth travelling for!) and the council there refused to let any offices be above the shops, all the shops had ppl living above. most of them owned the shop below. being bakers we were there nice and early in the morning and there were people walking dogs, leaning out of windows (in my romantic mind i can picture someone bashing a rug, but i might be abit imaginative there) and i thought how lovely this town is alive early in the morning, and let me tell u, the restaurants and pubs there did very well. i would love to see more people living in town.