Many of the policies within the draft Neighbourhood Plan are concerned with keeping Colne vibrant and, for towns to be vibrant and busy, their businesses must thrive. The Neighbourhood Plan Working Group contains quite a few business people, so policies have been drafted with businesses in mind.
The Working Group has created an on-line survey for people owning or operating businesses in Colne to fill in. You can access the business survey here: https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/ColneNeighbourhoodPlan
Cllr Sarah Cockburn-Price, chairman of the Neighbourhood Plan Working Group, explained: “We are looking for input at this stage to refine our policies and to garner as much support from Colne’s business community as we possibly can. Neighbourhood Plans have real planning weight and help towns to enhance and protect themselves, making them better places to do business. There aren’t so many of them up North and there are even fewer urban districts that have made a Neighbourhood Plan.
“As ever, Colne is a bit of a trailblazer. Colne Town Council has been working on its Neighbourhood Plan for three years now and it covers a host of topics from street trees to shop fronts. If adopted by referendum next year, Colne’s Neighbourhood Plan will be one of the biggest in the country.”
The team behind the Plan consists of councillors, community groups and small business people. They have formulated a series of policies focussed on the Town Centre and you can read these via this link (policies on the Town Centre begin on page 24):
The Town Council is keen for as many people as possible to engage with the Plan and, ideally, support it. You can find the form to do this here. Businesses and individuals have until 8th January to do this, as this is when the Formal Consultation period (Regulation 14) ends.
