To approve the acceptance and spend of Stronger Towns £403,655.00 funding to complete delivery of the three elements of the project; community grants, sedum bus shelters, and active travel measures on the Great Western Way in Hereford.

Greening the City aims to improve the appearance, environment and perception of the City of

Hereford significantly and will complement, and add value to, a number of current and planned policy initiatives including Hereford City Centre Improvements Project, Hereford City Centre Transport Project, countywide Active Travel Measures and two projects that have received funding as part of the Accelerated Funding phase – e-Bikes and tree planting. These “sense of place” elements will look to change perceptions of the city by introducing significant amounts of greening. This will lead to a more welcoming and unique place to visit and spend time within, leading to increased footfall in the city centre as well as longer dwell times.

The Greening the City project will be delivered within three elements:

 Active Travel Measures on the Great Western Way, between Widemarsh Common and Barton Road

 Installation of sedum bus shelters at locations identified within the city; this will add to and

support the existing roll out programme;

 Community greening grants – these grants will be offered to community groups to undertake

greening to areas in need of visual improvement, more greenery or greater biodiversity.

That:

a) To accept and spend the £403,655 (capital) of Stronger Towns funding offered by

government,

b) Authority is delegated to the Service Director for Highways and Transport in

consultation with the Cabinet Member Infrastructure and Transport to make all

operational decisions required to complete the implementation of the Stronger Towns,

Greening the City project.

1. Do nothing. Not delivering Greening the City would significantly reduce the budgetary pressure on the overall Towns Fund programme and enable all other Towns Fund projects to proceed -benefiting a wide range of community projects. However, there would be nothing within the Towns Improvement Programme to address the connectivity issues north / south across the city. Communities south of the river would not benefit from improved walking and cycling routes in the city centre.

2. Deliver a wider range of active travel measures as opposed to green infrastructure or signage. Whilst this option would benefit the connectivity elements to the Town Improvement Plan and enable an increased focus on improving the connectivity across the city, this option would detract from the desire to improve green infrastructure and wayfinding elements of the project; these were identified as important within the community consultation completed in preparation for the submission of the outline business case.

3. Deliver a wider range of green infrastructure measures as opposed to active travel measures or signage. Improving the visual appearance of the city through the targeted use of green infrastructure has been identified during the community consultation as a key driver for the project and one of the critical success factors. Adopting this route would detract from the active travel and improved wayfinding elements of the project that were identified as important within the community consultation. In addition, there is uncertainty whether the project would get sufficient private sector engagement to spend the whole budget on green infrastructure. This is particularly an issue when green infrastructure would be required to be located on private sector owned land or buildings.