Douglas Development Partnership has taken the first step towards Purple Flag accreditation, a scheme that aims to raise standards and improve the quality of town and city centres at night.
An initiative from the Association of Town Centre Management (ACTM) the Purple Flag scheme looks at a town’s night time economy from the perspective of how good a town or city centre is for a night out.
The Partnership’s first step took the form of a workshop led by development manager Chris Pycroft and attended by representatives from Douglas’s hospitality and retail operators, the police and voluntary agencies.
The session looked at the four Purple Flag standards:
* Wellbeing: crime, fear of crime and antisocial behaviour;
* Movement: late-night transport, car parking and access;
* Appeal: the offer of the town centre at night;
* Place: land uses and an attractive, functional destination.
Additionally, collaboration between agencies was explored.
Mr Pycroft said: ‘The UK night time economy is worth around ?66bn annually. The Purple Flag scheme isn’t just about setting a benchmark for pubs and bars; it’s about hotels and leisure facilities and generally creating a more successful mixed use night time economy’, and he outlined how accreditation can help dispel misconceptions about crime levels, increase visitor numbers and stimulate the town’s and, by extension, the Island’s economy.
He continued: ‘It’s early days yet but the workshop was a very successful exercise which has given us a great foundation on which to prepare the bid. It was also a good turnout from a very broad range of interests from both the public and private sector. With current initiatives and those in the pipeline, Douglas appears to score very highly in relation to the wellbeing criteria, fairly well in relation to place and movement but there is work to be done on building the appeal of the town at night. The workshop gave us a good indication of where there are gaps in appeal and how we might start to fill them. We now have a good idea about what area the Purple Flag will cover and a map will be published shortly then, during the next stage, we will be seeking public input.’
For more information about the Purple Flag scheme visit purpleflag.org.uk.
Photo - Development manager Chris Pycroft. Picture Andrew Barton.
