Agenda and minutes

These had been received from Councillors Hannah Hockaday and Simon Bosher.  Marc Griffin had also sent his apologies for absence.

There were no declarations of members' interests.

These were agreed as a correct record to be signed by the chair accordingly.

a)    Traders Associations - Tony Broome from Cosham Traders' Association has been invited to attend 

(Jenni Catlow from Albert Road is unable to attend this meeting but will pass her comments to the panel via Barry Walker)

b)    PCC Transport officers - the following officers have been invited to attend to address transport issues:

·         Marc Griffin, Assistant Head of Service, Environment & Transport

·         Nicola Waight, Environmental Change & Sports Development Team Manager

·         Danny Johnson, Passenger Transport Officer

·         Michael Robinson, Parking Operations Manager (has to leave by 7.10 to attend another meeting)

·         Jo Cole, Carbon Reduction Co-ordinator

c)    Report back from High Streets Conference - report attached by Cllr Julie Swan who attended the DCLG conference on 18 September "The Future of UK High Streets: Driving Local Growth and Regeneration" on behalf of the panel, which was also attended by Claire Upton-Brown, City Development Manager

Traders' Associations

The chair agreed to vary the order of business as unfortunately Tony Broome from Cosham Traders' Association had sent his apologies that he would no longer be able to attend this meeting.  Barry Walker had received some comments from Mr Broome and some detailed comments from Jenni Catlow from Albert Road, they would both be invited to the next meeting when the traders' associations and the role of the town centre management officers would be discussed in full.

Public Transport

Danny Johnson, the Passenger Transport Officer produced large maps showing the routes available to the secondary shopping areas and also circulated copies of the published public transport map showing all the bus routes in the city.  The city council does not run the bus services - this is a commercial venture run by bus operators First and Stagecoach in the city.  The bus operators provide 86% of bus service mileage with the council purchasing 14%. This is in areas where the operators will not provide services because they would not be commercially viable but where the council identifies a social need. e.g. the Highbury Estate.  He stressed there had been a large investment in new buses by both bus companies in the city during the last year. The council had also provided excellent infrastructure with the replacement of all 343 bus shelters over the last 6 years, raised kerbs at 580 of the 623 bus stops, new bus stop flags and the current installation of Real Time Passenger Information in 83 bus shelters, which will be completed by March 2015.

The Passenger Transport Officer outlined the frequency of services:

·      all secondary shopping areas are reasonably well served as identified in the large map provided by Danny and the Public Transport Map. The city is covered by 6 ten minute frequency services, with a further 15 services that have a frequency of between 15 and 70 minutes.  For example Highbury buildings is served by 32 buses an hour while Locksway Road shops and Baffins Road shops are served by 2 buses per hour;  

·      in response to questions it was reported that the 18 service into Paulsgrove was not ceasing.  The number 18 provides a half hourly service up to Hillsley Road. Due to some punctuality issues First have introduced an additional bus into the service to improve punctuality. To mitigate the cost of this change a couple of very early morning journeys were withdrawn. This did not affect the shops as the withdrawn journeys operated well before the shops opened. The shops at Allaway Avenue is served by 3 services, the 2 and 3 on a ten minute frequency and the 18 on a 30 minute frequency. 14 buses per hour in each direction;

·      Danny asked if the panel considered Ocean Park to be a secondary shopping area as this area was only served by the 19 service a two hourly frequency. The general concesus was that most customers travelled there by car;

·      Sometimes the outcome of consultation  ...  view the full minutes text for item 30.

To set the date of the next EDCL panel meeting and which witnesses to invite.

It was agreed the next meeting take place on Wednesday 12 November at 6.00 pm with the traders' associations to be invited and also Lindy Elliott, Steve Baily and Jane Mee to talk about museums and the library involvement in retail centres.

The chair asked that the deferred items on traders associations be discussed in more detail along with the reports provided regarding town centre management at the next meeting, and discussion on of her attendance at the high street conference with Claire Upton-Brown (which was the subject of the other report on the agenda).