High five aim for city centre
A five-year plan to build on the recent success of Liverpool city centre has been unveiled.
The City Centre Management Strategy 2009 - 2014 is aimed at making the centre vibrant, safe and a highly desirable place to live, work and visit with a unique cultural leisure and retail offer. It also aims to successfully attract inward investment and continue major developments.
The ambitious plans will coordinate action by a number of organisations including the City Council, Merseyside Police, Merseytravel and Liverpool Vision as well as major stakeholders such as Liverpool ONE and the Arena and Convention Centre.
It has three main objectives:
To create an environment and infrastructure that attracts inward investment
To make the city centre a highly desirable place to live, work and visit
To create a vibrant centre with a district sense of identity and unique experience
The establishment of the strategy and delivery of its key objectives will be the responsibility of a dedicated City Centre Management Team, who will oversee the coordination of services in the city centre.
Among the ways in which the city is hoping to achieve its aims is by bidding to gain Purple Flag accreditation for the city centre's night-time economy. This is a new initiative to promote high quality management and provision of the evening economy, equivalent to Green Flags awarded to well-managed parks.
Relationships with the growing population of the city centre - which now numbers about 20,000 - are to be strengthened through a newly created partnership with residents called Engage and through working with the City Centre Leaseholder Federation and the Liverpool Waterfront Residents Association.
There will also be a new look at the city's retail strategy following the success of Liverpool One and the implications for other parts of the centre.
Councillor Warren Bradley, city council leader, said: "The city centre is not just at the heart of the region but has been at the heart of the city's renaissance.
"There have been incredible new developments in the last decade or so in the city centre and, of course it staged many of the spectacular events for Capital of Culture.
"But we do not see that as the pinnacle - we want to keep the momentum going. By 2014 we want the city centre to be seen as a highly desirable place to live in - for families as well as single people - to visit and to work in.
"We want it to be an even safer place than it is at present, with a thriving night-time economy and animated by well -managed events
"And we want the whole of city centre to be as clean and as well maintained as the standards achieved in Liverpool One.
"All these are achievable aims but they do not happen by accident - they have to be managed and this is a strategy for how the city centre can be effectively managed over the next five years."
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Email: info@liverpoolvision.co.uk