Radical plan needed for city centre, report warns

Hanley has seen years of increasing shop vacancy rates

Stoke-on-Trent needs a "radical but deliverable" plan for the future of its city centre, a report to councillors has warned.

A "fresh strategy" is needed in order to attract investment and bring about transformation in Hanley, the report said.

External consultants will be paid to produce a new plan, with the final version expected to be ready by the end of April 2025.

The authority's cabinet member for regeneration, Finlay Gordon-McCusker, said: “We want to develop a viable mix of uses in which retail still has its place but alongside a wider range of things to do and see.”

Mr Gordon-McCusker said the authority expected there to be a significant increase in the number of people living in and nearby the city centre.

He added that the growth of out of town and online shopping had led to increased shop vacancy rates in the city, akin to those elsewhere in the country.

A budget of £200,000 has been set aside for the work, with the money coming from the UK Shared Prosperity Fund and the Levelling Up Partnership.

The council last produced a city centre plan in 2010.

Since then Hanley has had to contend with a decline in the number of people visiting the high street, the Covid-19 pandemic and an increase in the number of people working from home.

The city council hopes a new strategy could bring investment into Stoke-on-Trent city centre

“Despite the best efforts of the council, the Business Improvement District (BID) and committed long-term developers, the city centre is not fulfilling its role as our main city centre and this plan aims to turn that around by taking a very different approach," the report said.

“We don’t want to see another lost decade for our city centre, we want to deliver real regeneration and this work is vital to doing that.”

The plan will include strategies relating to commercial uses, residential, leisure, public realm and infrastructure.

Once completed, it will form part of Stoke-on-Trent’s forthcoming local plan, which will guide all development in the city up to the year 2040.

Jonathan Bellamy, chair of Stoke-on-Trent City Centre Business Improvement District, said: “A top quality plan, delivered with the participation of stakeholders, will provide a focused strategy that all will be able to get behind.”

“It will foster confidence for the future, raise the profile of the city centre and critically it will also help to attract the investment required to actually deliver it.”

The council’s cabinet will discuss the plan at a meeting on 30 July.

This news was gathered by the Local Democracy Reporting Service which covers councils and other public service organisations.