Newsletter Spring 2019
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Weybridge Society Your community association working for Weybridge Spring 2019 Hon. Patron – Michael Aspel OBE KEY WEYBRIDGE PROJECTS SECURE EBC AND SCC APPROVAL Elmbridge Borough Council (EBC) and the Weybridge Society and Weybridge Town Surrey County Council (SCC) have Business Group, after which SCC applied approved and begun work on a few major for funding of up to £150,000 to One Public projects designed to improve traffic and Estate to assess options and feasibility public services in Weybridge, marking a on a single masterplan vision for the victory for the Weybridge Society which has centre of Weybridge. long championed several of these schemes. Since 2017 in the aftermath of the fire that destroyed Weybridge’s heath centre, WRAP Success - One Public Estate (article continues p. 2) Funding Granted In a huge success for the Society, local IN THIS ISSUE councillors and Weybridge as a whole, the Government’s One Public Estate Fund has Be proud of Weybridge, spring into action and get involved! awarded £100,000 to EBC to work up plans for the rebuild, advancement and integration Welcome to this spring issue full of useful of Weybridge’s health and other services. news and updates on local developments, The award means EBC now has the plus a series of features on Weybridge’s incredible literary tradition! financial backing to work closely with colleagues from NHS property, Surrey 17 Your Library – Use it or Lose it! County Council and NHS’s North Surrey Support Key Local Services Clinical Commissioning Group to progress 21 Weybridge’s Most Famous through feasibility and options studies as Writer – EM Forster to how these authorities can best use their 23 Emile Zola in Exile, His Oatlands three town centre sites to achieve health, House Today community and social care requirements, 29 Local Author: Nick Thripp and alongside any wider ambitions such The Code as increased parking and/or affordable 30 Writers’ Group: Walton housing. The feasibility study should get Wordsmiths underway in the next few months of 2019. 32 Local Publisher GBP Takes on The award follows a meeting organised Weybridge Talent by Surrey County Councillor Tim Oliver with Weybridge Society Newsletter – Spring 2019 the Society has pushed councillors to take feedback on alternatives for development on board the Society’s Weybridge Rebuild of this important town centre site. and Advance Project (WRAP), a concept Brooklands Business Park Accessibility plan to regard Weybridge holistically as one integrated town centre rather than separate The EBC has secured £2,172,000 from the sites needing piecemeal upgrades. M3 Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP), a Oliver, who had a big hand in securing government funded body that invests in the One Public Estate funding for Weybridge, infrastructure support, to deliver sustainable said that a committee formed from members transport improvements between Brooklands representing the One Public Estate, SCC Business Park, Weybridge train station and and EBC would be in charge of distributing Weybridge town centre, including a new funds and overseeing the project but that cycle and pedestrian lane. The scheme also input from a WRAP steering committee includes the resurfacing of the top end of St would be very welcome. Georges Avenue. The fully scoped, total project budget Weybridge Hall is £2,896,000, with additional funding Despite work by EBC to move ahead with coming from local contributions from plans for a cinema in Weybridge Hall, initial EBC and SCC. All of this funding is now discussions have failed to produce results, confirmed as EBC’s Cabinet approved as courted cinema operators so far remain £625,000 in EBC Strategic CIL funding on reluctant to invest. 13th February 2019. EBC will continue to work to try and find Surrey Highways are now working to a suitable operator, as this venture would put in place the final legal agreements and bring more footfall to that end of the High cycle track orders for this project, with a Street. All further plans for refurbishing and view to start delivering on the project from repurposing the hall are progressing as April this year. Updates on this project, along planned, including the creation of a number with details of routes, are available on the of flats on the upper floors. Surrey Highways webpage at https://www. The Society had hoped this project enterprisem3.org.uk/content/brooklands- would be commercially viable and supported business-park-accessibility EBC efforts to revive the Hall as a cinema, Wider Brooklands Traffic not least because it would have provided Patterns Study continuity to Weybridge history. (see previous newsletter, winter 2017-18, p. 4, Surrey Highways has undertaken Weybridge Hall: Back to the Future? for preparatory work for the evidence- the fascinating life story of Weybridge Hall gathering phase of a traffic study of the as a cinema). wider Brooklands area, with a view to better Weybridge Hall could now fall within understanding the origin, destinations and the parameters of the broader Weybridge movements of commuters and residents Rebuild and Advance Project (WRAP) across Brooklands and Weybridge. which envisions bringing services from A working committee has drafted various authorities together in the town three surveys for residents, consumers centre. Residents are asked to give and employees and sought and received the Weybridge Society and the council approval from the Woking local committee to 2 Weybridge Society Newsletter – Spring 2019 include residential areas on the Woking side car turning points,’ said Oliver, mentioning of the border in the study, in order to get a even the possibility of instituting partial one- better picture of all three user groups. way traffic in places like Baker Street. No date has yet been set by Surrey Weybridge Streetscape Highways, but the project should start On 25th March, Councillors approved in the financial year 2019-20. Highways £128,000 Community Infrastructure Levy will welcome local feedback and further (CIL) funding for the Weybridge Streetscape information on the scope of the project will project. This town centre scheme aims to be provided via Society emails as soon as it improve pavements and create a market becomes available. place on the high street outside Waitrose Future High Street Fund and shops adjacent. As pre-construction work was nearly In March EBC entered a £200,000 bid complete ahead of the 25th March meeting, with the government’s Future High Streets Councillors were able to accurately assess Fund (FHSF) to improve Weybridge’s high this project and decided to proceed. Next street. The FHSF recently opened for local steps include agreeing a final price and authorities to seek co-funding towards capital appointing a contractor. The project should projects that bring transformative change then move to construction phase, with to their high streets, with the government works estimated at 16 weeks with a likely expecting bids between £5 million and six-to-eight-week lead-in time, subject to £10 million. contractor feedback. The FHSF is looking for applications The Weybridge Town Business Group, that support the regeneration of town with support from the Weybridge Society, centres through innovative proposals has been working on the Streetscape project around transport, housing delivery and since 2016. public services. As a town, Weybridge demonstrates a range of challenges: Surrey Highways housing affordability, a changing local Weybridge High Street study demographic, the need to attract and retain The Elmbridge Local Committee has given leading international businesses, and a the green light for the Weybridge High Street range of projects across the town centre Study, which will hopefully work alongside such as housing, sustainable transport, and build on the wider Brooklands evidence regeneration and services transformation. base (see item Wider Brooklands Traffic If granted, EBC hopes to spend the Study above) to look at the flow of traffic £200,000 on strategy, further feasibility through the town centre. work to assess the potential for further ‘The point of this study is to understand regeneration of EBC owned properties, the movement of people,’ said Oliver. ‘Is the and to support the second phase in traffic composed of people commuting to business case development and £7 million work or is it residents driving around or are in capital funding for the implementation of people seeking parking?’ Streetscape (see above.) Monies would also ‘The study will be looking at roundabouts go to updating properties in EBC ownership and traffic lights, the configurations and for transformation into affordable housing. timings, as well as pedestrian crossings and The request for £200,000 is matched by 3 Weybridge Society Newsletter – Spring 2019 £5.6 million in agreed projects that the EBC homes and townhouses. EBC councillors already has underway or has planned in agreed that the only way to tackle reduced the town centre to transform the town into housing stock for lower income residents in an economic, social and community hub. the area was to build up supply owned by Surrey County Councillor for Weybridge Tim EBC, which would also enable the council Oliver has also written to the government in to ensure a revenue stream as government support of EBC’s bid. funding to local authorities continues to fall. EBC hopes the programme and vision At a cabinet meeting on 10th January, will meet the government’s criteria for bids councillors agreed to set up the housing helping town centres develop beyond purely company owned by the council and set retail offerings. Retailers are reminded that aside £200,000 to finance the project. Elmbridge Borough Council also has a Civic The company is to work closely with Improvement fund which offers grants to social housing providers in the hope that improve or renovate shop fronts as well as Elmbridge can accelerate building up a supporting start-up businesses with advice stock of one and two-bedroom properties and training.