Councillors agree on plan to help town
COUNCILLORS have agreed a plan to help Kirkintilloch town centre recover from the economic impact of the coronavirus pandemic.
At a full meeting of East Dunbartonshire Council held online on Thursday, August 20, councillors voted to implement measures proposed by their officers.
These were to consider the progress made by Kirkintilloch Community Council on projects and initiatives derived from previous community engagement; to note the findings and suggested proposals from the recent Your Kirky survey carried out by KCC in response to the pandemic and thank those involved, to agree that council Officers would feed other suggestions from the survey into recovery planning and to continue to work relating to the Regent Gardens Project. t.
A report to the council highlighted the efforts of the community council which has been working to gauge local people’s views on the future of Kirkintilloch, while also running various projects such as the Kirky Picture Palace cinema, phone box art installations, the Create ED initiative and consultations with high street retailers about travel in the town along wirth consultation on improvements to be made at Regent Gardens.
Through its Your Kirky branding, the community council has also helped spread a positive message about the town and encouraged more people to play an active part in their community.
Retailers have been reopening as Scotland progresses in its roadmap out of lockdown, which has also seen changes in the ways people get around town with an increase in pedestrian journeys of more than one third and cycling journeys more than doubling.
Plans to pedestrianise Cowgate have been dropped but councillors reiterated their commitment to improving Regent Gardens, continuing plans which were first proposed in 2013.
This project has seen various public consultation exercises take place with a good response allowing for clear objectives to be set out. The next step is investigation and design work.
Officers will use external funding from SPT to support costs such as design work, site investigation, procurement and consultation and the expectation is that the next phase of the project will cost up to £100,000 – around a tenth of the total cost.