Revitalising our town centres
Part of making our district ‘the place of choice’ means investing money in making our town centres more people friendly and welcoming.
We’ve invested in cycleways, and are looking to invest in spas to bring people to town – and we need to make sure our town centres are places people want to stay, enjoy, and spend money.
What's in the draft budget - Improve our town centres
In the last 12 months we’ve received funding from the Waka Kotahi (NZTA) Innovating Streets Programme to test and trial changes that could improve our town centres, making them more inviting and safer for pedestrians – such as the changes to the Hetana St roading layout, currently being trialled in Matamata.
We’d like to continue working with our communities to make improvements to our CBDs, committing funding to both immediate improvements (such as bins and lighting), as well as developing ‘master plans’ for our town centres, to be implemented over the next ten years or more.
These master plans will provide an agreed vision with the community that we can work towards - the changes and improvements won’t be delivered overnight (some might take ten years or more), but each improvement we make will be a step towards achieving the vision set by the community.
What will it cost?
We’re proposing spending $617,000 on town centre upgrades throughout the district in 2022/23, then $2.8 million between 2024/25 and 2028/29 to continue to make improvements.
| Rates impact average annual increase | 2022/23 - 2030/31 |
| $550,000 urban property | $6.25 |
| $8 million rural property | $90.84 |
| Debt impact - Increase of $3.5 million by 2028/29 including inflation | |
Another option - do it faster
The development and implementation of master plans for all three towns is a significant project. We have proposed to do this over eight years, because we think that is a realistic timeframe based on the resources that we have (project managers, funding etc).
But if the community sees this as a priority, we could invest more money, earlier in the plan to speed up the delivery of these projects. This option could also add on more costs and will not allow as much planning.
What would this option cost?
This would still cost $3.2 million but would be completed within the first three years of the plan.
| Rates impact - Average per year | 2021/22 - 2030/31 |
| $550,000 urban property | $10.96 |
| $8 million rural property | $159.47 |
| Debt impact - increase of $3.2 million by 2023/24 including inflation | |
Another option - don't do it
Upgrades to our main streets will help make our towns more inviting and vibrant for both visitors and locals – but they’re not essential. If you would prefer Council to focus on keeping rates low, we could opt not to proceed with this project.
What would this option cost?
Not proceeding would avoid the cost, rates and debt impact that have been included in the draft budget.
