AMT Public

Overview of event – Typologies of Market Towns

Fortune favours the prepared mind - a new approach to understanding your market town

Friday 27 March 2009, Oakham, Rutland

Download printable version in Word

Contents

1.  Introduction

2.  Welcome to the day

3.  Raising Market Towns visibility – need and opportunity (Roger Turner, CRC)

4.  A Social, Economic and Functional Typology of Small Rural Towns and its potential contribution to rural development (Professor John Shepherd, Birkbeck, London)

5.  Short film – Stamford Town

6.  Workshop – Questions and outcomes

7.  Next Steps and useful links

8.  Contacts

1. Introduction

The current economic climate has hit hard – with job losses and the closure of some high street chains. The effects of recession appear to magnify in some of our small towns, which act as hubs for their rural hinterlands.  But this is not the case everywhere.

How and why are some towns faring better than others, and how can an understanding of these different circumstances better prepare communities to weather the storm?  There has never been a more important time for local partnerships and policy makers to understand the issues individual to their towns and to share best practice on how to address potential problems.

Agenda for the day

A presentation introducing Action for Market Towns was given, focussing on the Big Lottery funded Towns Alive programme, and the work of amt-i.  View the presentation.

2. Welcome to the day

Catherine Hammant, of the Welland Market Towns Group and Chair of Action for Market Towns, opened the event, by welcoming delegates to the market town of Oakham.  The Welland towns have undertaken much work to progress thinking on market towns, including devising a benchmarking approach, and were also the pilot area for the development of the typology model that this event is introducing.

3. Raising Market Towns visibility – need and opportunity

Roger Turner, Head of Rural Economies, Commission for Rural Communities

View Roger Turner’s presentation

The Commission for Rural Communities (CRC) was established in April 2005 and became an independent body on 1 October 2006, following the enactment of the NERC Act.  Its role is to provide well-informed, independent advice to government and ensure that policies reflect the real needs of people living and working in rural England, with a particular focus on tackling disadvantage.

Roger Turner is Head of Rural Economies at the CRC, and his presentation focused on the need to raise the visibility of market towns and opportunities for achieving this.  The main points from his session were:

Low ‘visibility’ Issues - Market towns, as hubs for their rural hinterlands, do not feature greatly in national policy and this needs to be addressed.

Impact of the current economic climate- The recession, however, is bringing to the fore some key issues for market towns and the rural areas they support:

• Economic – such as high street shop closures, reduced job vacancies.
• Housing – such as fewer affordable houses being built, fewer completions.
• Business – Closure/ downsizing of businesses that town is reliant on.

Monitoring and advising on the situation - The CRC is monitoring the situation and reporting to Hilary Benn, Secretary of State for the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) and the National Economic Council, which was set up to coordinate economic policies across Government.

Working in partnership with a range of organisations, including the Regional Development Agencies, the UK Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform (BERR), and Defra, the CRC compile regular intelligence reports on how the rural economy is faring.  As part of this process, they are encouraging debate and making recommendations for action.  Reports can be found at the CRC website.

Filling the gaps in evidence - There are still gaps in evidence however, in terms of both geography and types of area.  One way to address this is a new piece of research being undertaken by the CRC in partnership with amt-i and the Centre for Local Economic Strategies.  This will examine how market towns are coping with the recession, and will identify examples of best practice to share with more widely.  More information on this study can be found at the end bottom of the page under the ‘Next Steps’ section.

Opportunities for greater visibility at national policy level -  At a national level, there are a range of policies that market towns can latch onto  to assist in making themselves more ‘visible’ and aid their ability to cope with the recession and continue to be economically sustainable in the longer term:

• Single Regional Strategies – Highlighted in the ‘Local Democracy, Economic Development and Construction Bill’, this will replace the existing Regional Economic Strategy (RES) and Regional Spatial Strategy (RSS). It will also integrate the substance of other regional strategies covering culture and sport, housing, biodiversity and transport, and will have a 15-20 year outlook.
• Local Economic Assessments – There is now a duty on county councils and unitary authorities to assess their local economies. This includes identifying such issues as commuter flows, typologies of place, skills sets and so on. The aims of this is to strengthen the local authority role in economic development and to build a robust economic evidence base.
• Local Development Framework - This is a suite of planning documents that set out a local authority’s future planning policies.
• Emphasis on coastal resorts, coalfield communities and City Regions – Policies exist specific to regenerating specific niches such as coastal towns and former coalfield areas. A focus on city-regions as part of the ‘place-shaping’ agenda, and opportunities for smaller towns to understand their relationship to these region and opportunities posed.

4. A Social, Economic and Functional Typology of Small Rural Towns and its potential contribution to rural development

Professor John Shepherd, Rural Evidence Research Centre, Birkbeck, University of London

View a snapshot of Professor Shepherd’s presentation on YouTube.

John Shepherd is Professor of Geography at Birkbeck College, University of London and Director of Defra’s  Rural Evidence Research Centre.  He has over twenty-five years experience of using GIS in policy-oriented situations including research on land use change and the planning process for Government on rural services, market towns, small settlements and landscape character.

Professor Shepherd introduced his ‘research in progress’ which examines the extent to which settlements with between 1500 and 40,000 population can be classified by socio-economic type and the presence or absence of a range of facilities. Some of the data availability issues involved in such analyses were also presented.

The emphasis of Professor Shepherd’s presentation was to open up a debate on how useful creating typologies of market towns in England might be in terms of influencing policy at all levels and how it might be best taken forward to offer a useful tool for both those having a role in the development of these small towns.  His presentation introduced the significance of small towns in the wider economy, the typology model he has devised to classify towns, and potential uses for this and opportunities for further development.  This current research is based on data from the 2001 census.  The main points from his session were:

Significance of ’small towns’ - Small towns are a niche in their own right, and require different approach in policy terms to larger conurbations and major urban centres, and also more rural areas.  In particular:

• Population size and location – they tend to serve both their immediate residents and the wider rural community.
• Demographics – over 90% ‘rural’ people live in them and are home to over 22% of England’s population.
• Important link between urban and rural economies – they are the ‘destination’ of 25% of daily work journeys and the ’source’ of about 35% of flows.
• Economic activity – they can be the drivers of local economic regeneration and are likely to provide a mix of economic activity to sustain the area.
• Social and cultural activity – often provide a centre for the community and a focus for developing cultural activity at a community level.

Small towns inclusion in economic policy:

• The need – small towns have a valuable role to play in terms of being locations of new affordable and private sector housing, ‘hubs’ for local retail, services, and public transport, and centres of information and services for tourism.
• The policy gap – There is a very mixed representation of small towns in national, regional and sub-regional development and economic plans. This needs to be addressed to make the most of the opportunities that small towns can provide.

Towards a typology of market towns - Understanding more about the types of small towns that exist might provide some clues as how best to address them within the policy context:

• Data selection – Census data is useful and can provide context, but other data is often difficult to come by and can have licensing issues. Also, mush of what makes a town distinctive is not quantifiable in terms of numbers. Nevertheless, the research makes use of 48 census data variables to formulate ‘clusters’ of small towns.
• 8 distinct ‘clusters’ of small towns were identified with description.
• When mapped across England, there is a broad regional pattern to ‘types’ of towns, but localised variations do exist, often within local authority boundaries.
• There are interesting readouts from the data in terms of population growth, information on provision of health (GP/ dental surgeries), retail and education, and also incomes and disadvantages.

Developing the Typology - This is a piece of research in progress and there is scope to improve the work to date, including accessing further data that is more localised and up-to-date, and reviewing the clusters in terms of how they might best be presented to have an impact on various policy issues.  Delegates were asked to think about these issues in readiness for the workshops in the afternoon.

5. Short film – Stamford Town

Stamford Town is a short film produced by The Welland Township, filmed by Image Productions.  It shows the main attractions of this Lincolnshire town.

View the Stamford Town video on YouTube.

6. Workshop – Questions and outcomes

In the afternoon, the delegates were divided into smaller groups to discuss a series of questions relating to both the Typology research and issues relating to the current recession.  The key points raised at the sessions are described below:

In what ways would using this sort of profiling be beneficial to your work?

• General agreement that developing a typology was worthwhile.  Whilst profiling does already exist in a broader sense, the idea of tailoring this specifically to the small town was seen as beneficial.

• Typologies might be useful for local authorities in putting together the Local Development Framework and other core strategies, as well as in community led planning in its broadest sense.   It would enable towns to position themselves more strongly if there is a greater understanding of their make-up, and perhaps scope to combine the typology work with benchmarking.

• Typologies are useful for making comparisons, both locally and regionally, and for understanding influences on a town.  They help to maintain focus on key issues and opportunities specific to a ‘type’ of town rather than, for example, indices of deprivation.

• Understanding ‘types’ of towns in a region, and in other regions, would be helpful when targeting investment at settlement level.  Often data exists only at a county, district or ward level.

• What is perhaps vital is the interaction between what you know about the place and what the typology tells you about it. Exploring the differences between the two can be revealing. It is useful in going to third parties to say how you have made your assessment and how a particular project can have a positive impact on the future development of that place.

• Certain issues that are key to the future of market towns – rental levels particularly for retail; the loss of employment land to residential development; and the vulnerability of places that rely on one large employer – might be better understood when viewed in relation to the type of town in question, especially when comparing against other towns of that type.

• There was a discussion about whether towns can swap from one type to another within the typology, and this was considered unlikely although not out of the question.  Uppingham was cited as example where population characteristics have changed since last census, so might be a candidate for having changed ‘type’.  This led to a call for updating key indicators between censuses.

• There was a note of caution about relying too heavily on just population data as it was thought that physical and environmental geography and location can have a strong influence on how a town develops.  There was then some debate about whether population data would partly reflect such geography.

• Within one local authority boundary there might be a number of small towns representing different clusters – it would be useful to know this and locate small towns elsewhere in these clusters so that comparisons can be made and lessons learnt.

• Those from unitary councils viewed the typologies as useful in terms of bringing together colleagues and data from the different tiers, leading to a greater understanding of the very local level.

• Understanding more about the ‘type’ of town might assist communication between town partnerships, local authorities and other public agencies as typologies appear to offer objectivity and comparisons.

• Understanding the type of town would add an element of objectivity to local authority ‘place shaping’ and public perceptions in line with new public service agreement targets.

How might the typology work be developed so that it can be used to impact on policies within towns/ nationally?

• There was debate about developing a typology within a ‘region’ and the possibility of presenting the information at different geographical levels. Would it be possible to also prioritise components in the comparison?

• Within a cluster significant variation between the towns might still be apparent, for example population size or range of services offered.  Is there a way to narrow down the towns within clusters?

• Some local authorities undertake Place Surveys which assess residents’ perceptions of their areas.  It would be interesting to compare these perceptions to the actual findings of the typology work for the small towns.

• Is there scope to include further variables in the cluster definitions, for example transport links or types of local services available in a town?

• How can the process be more closely linked to the process of community-led planning?

• A comment was made about how the types of towns are describes and that some were more aspirational than others.  In particular type 6 (ex-industrial) had negative connotations.

• Linking the typology work to the benchmarking of small towns, undertaking trips to other small towns of the same cluster and sharing good practice nationally.

• Is there scope to make the data simpler (ie plain English) so it can be more easily used by local partnerships who may have little training in economic issues.

• Is there scope to develop a Typology ‘twinning scheme’, matching like-towns together for the purpose of sharing best practice?

Do you know how your town is doing economically compared to other similar towns?

• Many towns were aware of how they were doing themselves, but unaware of how other similar towns are coping.

• Within areas, there was conflict between towns doing well and other towns nearby wanting to emulate them, yet not being in position to do so (perhaps because they have different assets in the town).

• Many towns have an old set of ‘healthcheck data’, and were keen to update this.

• Only way to find out how towns are faring in comparison to others is by asking or meeting other towns – this was often difficult to do if the networks do not exist.

• There was a perception that the term ‘market town’ gives an impression of affluence, but the reality is that pockets of deprivation do exist.   This was a particular problem when there is a large, successful conurbation in a local authority area that masks the problems of the smaller towns nearby.

• Little understanding of how more localised geographic areas are faring, as statistics tend to be produced on a county, district or ward level as opposed to by town.

• Better trained town councillors in understanding economic issues might be beneficial.

Are you are aware of good practice that you think could be transferred to other towns, or aspects of good practice that it might be useful to identify?

• In many small towns, there are lots of existing groups/ organisations trying to improve aspects of the town – is there a way to streamline this and get them working together to make better use of resources and reduce overlap and ‘competition’ at the vey local level?

• Twinning and benchmarking schemes were highlighted as good ways to understand best practice in other towns.

7. Next Steps and Useful Links

Taking forward the typology work
Professor John Shepherd will be taking forward the work on typologies with a new paper to be published shortly to include:

• A  description of the typology process, how it has been put together and the types of data it uses;
• A description of the 8 ‘clusters’ identified in the typology, with a map to show their geographical spread by region; and
• A further breakdown of each cluster in terms of some key variables and an analysis of more recent population growth.

Market Towns Healthscan and Townwatch
Action for Market Towns is currently finalising a revised and improved version of the Market Town Healthcheck as part of one of our key campaigns on community-led planning.  It will encourage usrs of the scheme to understand their town, by undertaking surveys and observing activity in the town.  The revised version will make reference to the typology work and will enable market towns to assess their ‘health’ in order to plan how best to take forward development.

A new element to the process is called ‘Townwatch’, which will an ongoing monitoring  of core facts about the town, gathered on-line and from other data sources.

The two elements, when take together will provide the basis for an ongoing understanding of how your town operates and develops over time, in order to understand the kinds of policies you might want to put in place to achieve your vision for the town.

Need more information?
The revised healthscan will be available shortly and if you are interested in finding out more information, please contact amt-i (contact details at the bottom of this page).

Benchmarking – Measuring the success of your town and region
Benchmarking is a web based system which has been developed by market town partnerships to address the real issues of how to develop thriving communities.  Benchmarking provides towns with a method to capture key data. It will help them measure important aspects of their town centre including:

• The variety of shops and range of services
• A balance of comparison and convenience retail units
• The mix of multiple and independent retailers
• The provision of adequate and convenient
• Car parking facilities

Information is collected on twelve key performance indicators which have been rigorously tested by those involved in town centre management.  The data is collated using an on-line recording system.

By collecting data in a consistent manner, towns have the opportunity to compare their results with those in the region by the simple click of a button.  Such working practices allow towns to widen their horizons and learn from others.  amt-i can provide access to benchmarking for £200 as well as opportunities for further bespoke training and support to guide users through the system.

Need more information?
We will be adding to our town centre product offer. Please keep updated by logging on to the amt-i website’s Market Town Centre Activities page.

Prosperous Places – Policy into Practice Paper
Policy into Practice is the title of a new series of bulletins from Action for Market Towns. These in-depth reports will cover topical issues of importance to market towns and help unravel the tangle of jargon which town partnerships face.

‘Prosperous Places: Making the Economy Work for Your Town’ is written by Camilla Govan, former Regional Network Co-ordinator for Yorkshire and Humber.   It examines how your town can develop a strategy for its economic development and to boost the business community.

It brings together a range of tools for developing a local economic strategy and introduces a range of approaches to promoting business activity.  It also provides some policy background and links to policy documents that may be helpful in developing and implementing economic plans. Finally, throughout the document there are case studies and links to additional sources of information.

Market Towns and the Recession

Research Study – Understanding and supporting the resilience of market towns
A new piece of research is being undertaken by the CRC in partnership with amt-i and the Centre for Local Economic Strategies.  This will examine how market towns are coping with the recession, and will have a number of elements:

• Understanding the problem – Online surveys to market towns to understand their issues and gather information.
• In-depth study – using the Typology approach to identify 10 market towns to examine in detail over the next 6-10 months.
• Communicating ‘coping tactics’ and solutions – developing case studies of strategies that work to combat the economic downturn and communicating these through the AMT website, the AMT Annual Convention and other correspondence.

Need more information?
To find out more contact Mike King at amt-i (contacts below).

Call for Market Town ‘Advocates’
Action for Market Towns wants to work to improve the visibility of market/ small towns withing national, regional and sub-regional policy.  In order to improve our focus on policy, we would like to develop a network of Market Town Advocates – people whose work is related to market towns and who have an interested in getting more involved in the policy side of market town development.  The role of the advocates will include feeding up information of relevance from the local level, and also providing feedback on AMT initiatives.

Need more information?
Further information on this will be available on the website shortly, but in the meantime, if you feel that this may be of interest to you, please contact Alison Eardley (see contacts below).

8. Contacts

If you have further thoughts on any of the items covered, or would like more information, please contact:
Action for Market Towns
Alison Eardley
Policy Manager
Email: Alison.Eardley@towns.org.uk
Telephone:07876 598 957

amt-i
Mike King
Senior Research Consultant
Email: mike.king@towns.org.uk
Telephone: 07818 068982