Member Article

Major Northumberland Street works next on the NE1 agenda

When Newcastle’s NE1 agency was established in 2009 the city’s businesses took a “leap of faith” in a project with unknown potential.

Now, the team of just six, headed by chief executive Sean Bullick, have just succeeded in securing another five-year term, backed by the city’s businesses.

Alive after Five free parking in Newcastle city centre and the redevelopment of Central Station are just a couple of the organisation’s most prominent initiatives to date.

They now turn their attention to major public realm developments and Northumberland Street and the Bigg Market are next on the list - with the aim to address “people flow” around the city.

This means better connecting the hospitals and universities with shopping areas.

NE1 public realm plans for The Gate

Sean explains: “Northumberland Street, as the most important shopping street in the region, is in need of a revamp - partly because it doesn’t look great but also because it doesn’t always provide the environment and amenities that businesses want to move in there, and consumers want to visit there.

“The Bigg Market is hive of activity in the evening and night time, but it hasn’t had a lot of investment and we’d like to see a better environment for business during the day.”

Elsewhere Sean’s team will work on the Zapcat powerboat racing on the Tyne; support for a gay provide event; the Urban Games; Fashion Week and Restaurant Week.

Sean adds: “It’s about achieving the balance between work on the everyday events that make people want to come to the city, and the longer term projects that help to cement our position as a Northern European capital.”

NE1 are funded by a levy on city business rates - roughly £2 million in total - a small proportion of which pays for staff and other overheads. The rest goes towards projects and is supplemented with larger sums of investment from outside sources.

Sean explains: “Our role is about bringing interested parties together and perhaps providing some seed funding. For example, on the Central Station project, we provided half a million pounds which has resulted in £20 million of overall investment. We’d expect to do something similar with Northumberland Street.”

‘Alive after Five’ saw NE1 bring together retailers, leisure operators and public transport operators together in a late-night shopping initiative that is reckoned to be worth £250 million to the city since launching in 2010.

“We would never ask for a handout, this is about asking people for investment in which they will see a return. If you’re a restaurateur and you’ve been involved in Restaurant Week - you will see your contribution returned many times over as a result of the project,” adds Sean.

“Similarly, retailers will see benefit from Alive after Five, but so will a law firm because it benefits their staff.”

Sean is confident that significant growth opportunities are now on the horizon for Newcastle, having weathered the economic downturn in the last few years.

Projects such as East Pilgrim Street’s regeneration are likely to make “millions, if not billions” for the city’s businesses, he says.

The inspiration for NE1 projects comes not only from the consultation and engagement with the city’s businesses but also from other cities.

Sean explains: “We’re careful not to use cliched examples - we’re not just trying to ‘do a Barcelona.’ We look at what does well in different cities, and why.

“In our business proposal we made reference to Stockholm which had done some innovative things for major shopping streets. There’s a place in Germany called Aachen that has done a good job of incorporating its backstreets into the main offer.”

Newcastle businesses with ideas for NE1 should get in touch with Sean Bullick via sean.bullick@newcastlene1ltd.com or on 0191 235 7091.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Tom Keighley .