AMT Public

The April 2010 member town profile is Uppingham in Rutland. The AMT member is Uppingham First Community Partnership, which was incorporated as a limited company in 2009.

Uppingham has a population of around 3,800 and, as well as Uppingham First, also has an elected town council. Click here to view a video, ‘Discover Uppingham’

Uppingham has been in the news this month for the launch of an innovative project to provide high-speed broadband for the town by wireless. The pilot stage, completed in March 2010, provided broadband access to 135 houses.

The project is being undertaken by local company Rutland Telecom, which is specializing in providing fast broadband to rural areas using a system called ‘rural loop unbundling’. Click here for full details of the project.

Action for Market Towns membership has been useful for Uppingham Forward. An AMT Towns-4-Towns Exchange Grant was used to part fund the exchange of experience and technical knowledge with Swindon BC. (Swindon was the first town in the UK to provide free wireless internet access to all of its residents). Towns-4-Towns grants are designed to enable towns which have implemented projects to share their experience and, equally, for towns who are considering particular projects to visit and learn from towns which have already undertaken similar work. For more details, go to: http://towns.org.uk/good-practice/towns-4-towns-exchange-fund/

A major task for Uppingham First was a public consultation leading to the publication of  ‘Uppingham 2025 – A Community Development Plan’. This makes proposals on the future shape, character and size of Uppingham, its future image for promotional/tourism purposes, as well as proposals of particular relevance to local residents, visitors and those who work or own a business in the town. Click here to view a copy of the community plan.

Uppingham First company secretary, Ron Simpson, finds the AMT website particularly useful.  “As Uppingham is not the principal town in Rutland, the AMT website is invaluable and  very useful for finding out what is happening in other market towns around the country through its news,” he said.

Ron has found the town benchmarking project carried out by the Welland market towns very useful from a statistical point of view, and Uppingham First has been benchmarking itself to some degree and using case studies  on the website to find out about new ideas.  For more details of the Welland benchmarking project, and how amt-i can provide research and consultancy support, go to: http://www.townbenchmarking.org.uk/amti.aspx

Uppingham First uses the AMT member benefit of discounted public liability insurance with Zurich – Insight  - which Ron says is at a good comparative rate and is used to cover approximately six major events a year, ranging from  Late Night Shopping, Classic Cars  to Festivals. Check out the insurance package at: http://towns.org.uk/2008/12/01/insurance-for-local-groups/

For more information about Uppingham. Check out these weblinks:

Town Council http://www.uppinghamtowncouncil.co.uk/

Uppingham First http://www.uppinghamfirst.co.uk/

Rutland Telecom http://www.relay-rutlandtelecom.co.uk/