The unemployment figures on the graph below for Ellesmere tell me that. In 1987 the unemployment has started to rise, one year before the Dairy closed in 1988. This could be because The Dairy was trying to keep in business by laying off a few jobs, to save money in 1987.
But since 1981 the Unemployment has risen by 12.5%. This is because the 400 people who worked at the Dairy had lost there job’s there and because most of them could not find jobs in and around Ellesmere they had to move into other area for jobs. This would leave Ellesmere without most of the old Dairy workforce so all the shop and services would not be used as much as they were when the Creamery was running, which means that less business in Ellesmere. This would be putting the area in to a spiral of decline. Also by looking at the graph above we can see that mainly males are unemployed. This could because the largest part of the Dairy workforce was male.
The Graph to the right shows us the number of employed people in the north of Shropshire. As you can see that in the number of employed people is slowly creeping up, in most areas but there has been a significant drop in the number of full time employed males by 11% and is still dropping. If the redevelopment did go ahead, the new development could be the cause for the number of full time male worker to go up. Although some of the full time working males may have gone in to part time, but the graph shows that there is definitely a drop in full time males. The redevelopment would just not benefit Ellesmere it would benefit the whole County.
Question nine of the Questionnaire shows that more people say that Ellesmere should be redeveloped plains that did not. More than three quarters said that Ellesmere should be redeveloped. This percentage justifies that Ellesmere should be redeveloped. People who do not want Ellesmere to be redeveloped; may not know about the full plans, never been to see the old dairy site or they do not want Ellesmere to lose its small town status. They could have also attended the Public Enquiry and have become aware of the problems; the new plans could bring to the small town.
This picture shows just how bad the area looks; it is a place of ugliness and decay which really needs replacing. I have only highlighted a few of the imperfections shown by the buildings but as you can see it is a waste of space and need redeveloping.
I think all this information I have used should tell and prove to everyone that Ellesmere is in desperate need of being redeveloped. This redevelopment would benefit the County of Shropshire, the surrounding areas and as well as Ellesmere itself and its entire people making it a more convenient place to live for everyone. Improving and the services Ellesmere already has and enhancing its tourist capabilities.
Section.2 – What The Proposals Are For the Former Creamery Site:
In this section I will use questionnaire results 7 and 8, a map of the plan pictures of the site and a table summarising the proposals.
Question .7 asks if there new about the plan to redevelopment plan for Wharf Road.
As the graph above shows that almost as many people new about the development plan as that did not. Just over half new about the plans 55% and just under half did not 45%. This could because that relatively the same amount of tourist who did not know much about the area as people who did come from the area. There was a big showing for the new redevelopment plans at Ellesmere Town Hall, it was shown in a well know area newspaper and it is also on the official Ellesmere website. So I think there should be more people who know about the plans. These figures also could show that there a quite a few of tourist that come into Ellesmere area and by redevelopment the number of tourist could increase.
Question 8 in the questionnaire asks how much people already know about the redevelopment plan, asking for what facilities the redevelopment will offer e.g. Housing, Cinema and a Camp Site. Most people said that there was Housing to be built, car park and a Shopping Precinct. As shown below:
As you may know there are may different development plans and they do not all include the same features when compared, this is why the results may differ. The main purposes for the development plans are show in the other two tables; ‘Summary Of The Development Plans For Wharf Road’ and ‘The Plan To Redevelop The Former Creamery In Ellesmere’.
Section.3 – Ellesmere Current Function:
In this section I am going to try and show you what Ellesmere’s current function by using a range of different statistics.
Question.1 asks; ‘what is the main purpose of your visit to Ellesmere today? The graph above shows that most of the people come to Ellesmere for there shopping which is about 2/5 of them come for shopping. Ellesmere is a small market town which attracts many local people in to come to the market on Saturdays. There is also a large verity of shops which provide the area which a large amount of goods. The chart also shows that about 3/10 of the people who come to Ellesmere are also Tourists. Tourists may come because it a local and easy to get to with the Mere it is a very welcoming area place with a lot of natural beauty around the Mere (the Mere is one of the larges in a series of small natural lakes which surround Ellesmere). The Mere also have a nature reserve and a Tourist Information Centre around it other services also are very high ranking in the chart this show that Ellesmere has diversity. There are few people coming into Ellesmere for work because most of the people would have probably been in work when we went out and did our questionnaires
This Question asks; ‘Why do you shop in Ellesmere?’ Almost ½ or 50% of the people who come to Ellesmere is because it come to home or covenant for there people this show that people actually want to come into Ellesmere not just that they have to. The Donut Chart also shows that there is parking in Ellesmere, a good choice, close to work and the Environment. Suggesting to us that Ellesmere is pleasant and welcoming area. The Chart above and the Graph to the left show us why people come to would want to come to Ellesmere. As up can see that over half of the people who come to into Ellesmere for the Groceries this tell Ellesmere has a wide spread of high quality Groceries, also linked to that is all the people who come for the fresh produce around about 1/3. 3/4 of the people who use Ellesmere are for Food shopping. Next many people also come for cloths shopping all most 11% which is a surprise because there are three little main cloths shops in this area, including Oxfam.
Question six asks ‘In which country do you live’ as you can see almost ¾ of the people who come into the area are from the county of Shropshire which is only a few minutes drive to get into Ellesmere which makes I a easily accessed area to get to. Secondly I notice that 4% of people came from the surrounding counties of Cheshire and Wrexham/ Clwyd. These are also local areas, people could come to Ellesmere to meet relation, friends and for the tourism. 3% of people also came from the West Midlands these could have been for the same reason. To my surprise 1one person came from U.S.A. and another From Italy this tell me that these people have travailed great distances just to go to Ellesmere showing that the area great potential
Question five asks; ‘How have you travelled into Ellesmere’ the Graph below shows that the majority of people travail to Ellesmere 55%. This is because a car is an easy method of travelling because you are able to travel when you want to, take detours its there for you to use and it faster and privet. The second highest percentage of a form of transport is walking which is about 1/10 or 21% of people who walk into Ellesmere these people walk because it’s close to home, saves money instead of diving or catching any public transport and it healthily for the person. A large amount of tourist get to Ellesmere by Boat this is because the area has many different canal routes.
It was surprise to see how many who were using public transport, only 8.This could be because they run at inconvenient times uncomfortable, smelly and expensive.
Finally question. 4 asks; ‘How frequently do you visit Ellesmere’. As you can probably there not very many people visit Ellesmere fortnightly or on monthly. This may because there is not enough of something to bring people back to this area more regularly. ½ of them who come into Ellesmere come on a Daily bases this could be because they have jobs hear, they have to pick there children from school or shopping. 20% of people come a Less bases this suggest that the majority of these are mainly tourists.
19% of the people who come to Ellesmere come Weekly this could be because they want to stock up on shopping good or there visiting.
All of these graphs shows that Ellesmere is mainly a small Market town with which is mainly accessed by cars on a daily bases. It also has a reasonable amount of tourist visits from people locally and from around the world, who access Ellesmere in mainly different ways, a Tourist Town.
Section.4 – Are The Proposals Good For Ellesmere In the Future:
In this section I am going to decide and see which proposals would suite Ellesmere the best and say why. The redevelopment to Ellesmere would benefit shops, other businesses and tourists.
Burbury say that the redevelopment would be a good thing for Ellesmere because it would attack around about two million people a year, giving an yearly turnover of £30 million, in turn this has created more trade in Ellesmere and a greater amount of trade would therefore creating more jobs in North Shropshire. Jobs would also be created in the different social economic groups:
Younger teenagers and early adults (13 -25 years old):
- Small part job could be created in the factory outlet shops, wine bar, public house and restaurant, creating
- These part time jobs could support this generation Educational needs, as well as there leisure needs.
- These jobs would normally be the low paid labour jobs e.g. cleaner and waiters.
- They could also that on full time jobs when they leave secondary school, some of these businesses may offer partnerships of these people. From there they can go on and earn a higher wage improving there standard of living.
Adults (25-50):
- Mainly full time jobs go into this category in factory outlet shops, wine bar, public house restaurant, Caravan Park and indoor leisure facilities.
- These could range from the higher paid managers to the lower paid cleaning jobs.
- These would support these people living and leisure actives.
- These increase in need for jobs would bring more people into the area maybe in compel them to even live in Ellesmere.
- Jobs would be created for the unemployed in Ellesmere. This money that they would earn could support them.
This would therefore reduce the need for people to travel to other towns like Oswestry for shopping, jobs and other services. Revealing the stress on Oswestry, which already has been redeveloped and is reaping the benefits of it. Ellesmere main source of income at the moment s with tourists by redeveloping Wharf Road it would create a stronger back bone for Ellesmere to fall back on rather than tourism, where the main majority of people come in the summer when the weather is better. We could potentially have a more unstable rain filled summer which would decrease the amount of tourists therefore reducing the amount of trade, giving Ellesmere an unstable, unreliable back bone. This would overall change in retail for the people of Ellesmere would be for the general good of the community and starting the Multiplier Effect. This is when the government puts money in to an area for redevelopment or other different projects. From this point the area should no longer need money in future because it will prosper off the money it will make through its own business.
Secondly Morris and company have purposed to place a caravan site for at least 120 pitches. They are predicted to stay for an average of 4 nights. If people were to stay for this length of time it is likely that they would need to use the different service, shop and restraints in Ellesmere, creating more money and trade pulling up the overall yearly turn over benefiting the whole of North Shropshire. Recently there has been a rise in the demand for camp sites and the number of people using the, this demand creates and great opportunity for Ellesmere to cash in on this increasing demand. The Camp site would be on an ongoing increase bringing in more and more money each year. This caravan site will come as extra bones to the original plan increasing the amount of income and benefit the services making them used a lot more therefore collecting more money.
North Shropshire district council Planning Department say that this scheme should not have any major effect on the area; this means that Ellesmere would be able to keep it rural status keeping a pleasant and still a quiet place to live. They state that the former Creamy site has been regarded as being very unattractive taking away some of the benefits of a Conservation Area that cove most of the town centre. It has also been notice that the number of vacancies in Ellesmere has risen by 60% in between 1987 and 1993. This shows that Ellesmere Spiral of decline is become very deep. The redevelopment would better the physical appearance of Ellesmere in turn possible attracting more people into the area mainly through tourism there has also been few council objections therefore making there seem little or no reasons why not the project should not go ahead
The Environment Agency / National Rivers Authority insure us that the water in the canal and other natural streams in the area will be kept to a high quality in the local area, by keeping the water in the local area clean it could therefore make the area more attractive and pleasant, possibly bring in more tourists into the area, in turn more money, through leisure uses e.g. fishing This could all be done at a relatively low cost because the old Dairy site had its own sewage works, which could be reopen with the redevelopment keeping the water clean and saving money instead of building a brand new works.
Ellesmere Town Council have be monitoring the employment status of Ellesmere and the surrounding area and have found a significantly large decrease in the employment satiates , which has put Ellesmere in to a dangerous Spiral of Decline which could potentially cause the end of the town. Any redevelopment plan which stands a large chance of pulling Ellesmere of it Spiral of Decline is in great need as long as it does not destroy the town’s visible history and is also concerned about the transport links the redevelopment site. But the plan for redevelopment includes new road links to Wharf Road.
The Traffic which could be created has been shown as a major concern and hitch in the plans. The redevelopment would create a lot more traffic along the small already busy roads in and around Ellesmere making them even more congested than before. The increase in traffic around the town centre could cause the old foundations of the buildings to vibrate causing them to weakened and potentially dangerous. The road has not been designed to take such a high velocity of traffic which would make them easily damaged. The amount of noise pollution would be created by the traffic could be keeping people awake and making it hard for these people to live a normal life. There would be a large increase in CO2 emissions adding to global warming and polluting the fresh air in the area. Animal would become more endangered and at risk of being killed by passing traffic, maybe decreasing the amount of certain species in ad around the area. Children in the area and other people would become more at risk of becoming injured and perhaps killed by the traffic. There has also been the problem of the access to Wharf road there is at the moment only one small B road double lane which will not even have a chance of coping with the traffic if the redevelopment goes through. There would also be a big problem with parking your vehicles, the new development would problem bring in many many people and their cars into the area making it easy to park. Instead people may park in non-car parking spaces causing small crimes and more congestion in Ellesmere. If the redevelopment did go through it would be essential for the a new easy access road/ a link road to be built to Wharf Road to stop the bulk of the cars from entering the town centre weakening the buildings and to keep the rural status for Ellesmere. The link Road to Wharf Road may come as a problem because housing would have to knock down to make way for the new road link road.
The New caravan site would be built next to the Swage Works. This could make it an unpleasant camp site to stay by being an eyesore and may smell bad. Making people not want to stay at the site or come back to it. There is also a problem that people could interfere with the works polluting the water contaminating it for the people of Ellesmere. Trouble makers could come and stay the night causing trouble on the camp site and n the town centre also making the other camper not wanting to come back and this could make the people of Ellesmere change their attitudes to income tourists being unfriendly and cousins to other tourist losing Ellesmere its bad name.
All the new and incoming tourists could make Ellesmere a noisy, busy urbanised town. This could make Ellesmere lose its originality, character and statuses as an old market town, which has been responsible for attracting the main bulk of Ellesmere tourists. This is the back bone of Ellesmere at the moment. There would be a litter could be a litter problem making Ellesmere a less clean and tidy place. Place like the Mere which does not really have a littler problem at the moment, the increase could make Ellesmere become littered and be a less attractive place to go losing it tourists.
Local shops could also be losing out on their business it was predicted by Burbury that the Co-Op and Spar would be losing out on about 35% of the original business after the redevelopment had go ahead. The local’s shops may not be able to coupe with a loss in business causing them to close down taken the main business away from the C.B.D. and onto the new development causing the town centre to close down and become a waste of space. The new jobs which would be created by the redevelopment would be the mainly tertiary job where on a whole mainly females work in tertiary jobs which is a problem in Ellesmere because the majority of unemployment is in Males so there could still be a problem created by the redevelopment for males
The amount of people who may be moving into the area with the redevelopment could put a large amount of pressure on the services. Services such as Lakeland School which would also have a problem with largely increasing amounts of incoming children. Which the school is already having problems with accepting and trying to find a place for.
There are many different Groups which are against the redevelopment. The Society For The Preservation Of Rural Ellesmere. They believe that something does need to be done about the dairy but this is not a step in the right direction. They say if the redevelopment did go ahead, the various different services would not be able to cope with the crowds of people the redevelopment is expected to bring in especial the roads and the car parking because 96% of people a expected travel by car increasing the stress Ellesmere’s rural area.
North Shropshire Friends Of The Earth, say that; ‘More traffic to the area will bring more pollution. Saying that the addiction amount of carbon dioxide had not been concerned in the development plans and how it could damage the area. They also specify where the main bulk of the congestion would take place; Spar Bridge roundabout, and the mini-round about off Scotland Street and Victoria Street. Also these roads would not be able to take the heavy stress that the lorries, caravans etc…
The group feel that there is already too much dependence on private motor cars; the development would only encourage an increase this number which cannot be good for Ellesmere. The congestion can cause an increase in ill health in the area because when vehicles are idling or driving slowly, which are the conditions of congestion.
I think the redevelopment of Ellesmere would be a good investment for the North of Shropshire and Ellesmere itself. I think this because at the moment Ellesmere is suffering from a dangerous spiral of decline which could easily become the end of this small town. The spiral of decline has started since the Dairy was shut and left to become derelict we can tell this by my field sketches and photo of the dairy (shown in section 1:
- Broken windows/ boarded up windows
- Overgrowing plant life e.g. moss and various bushes.
- Smashed in doors/ forced open gates
- Ripped down signs/ warning signs.
Since then the Dairy site has become a place of ugliness (some of the man ugly points are shown above, the rest are in my field sketches and photo).The redevelopment of the dairy would mean that there would be shops and a new access road put in place of the dairy, shops like the small supermarket and the public house etc... This would look far better than a derelict Creamery site. 29% of the people who come to Ellesmere are tourists and 14 people in the space of two days came to Ellesmere by canal boat and to get in to Ellesmere they have to walk or sail past the old dairy site because of the roughness of this part of Ellesmere it could be a deterrent for these people to come back to Ellesmere. But if the developments did go ahead it would make the area look a lot better than the old Dairy site. Other tourists which visit the area would see the redevelopment and may tell other friends that the area has been redeveloped and may convince them to come back to Ellesmere, making a chain reaction.
The loss of jobs from the Dairy has caused some of Ellesmere’s people to move away to find other jobs as result spelling the end for some shop and a local Bank. This has caused Ellesmere to fall back on there tourist business rather than their trade. Tourism is a very fluctuant business attacking the main bulk of their visitors during the summer time, when the weather is better. But we can sometimes have very wet and unreliable summers, which could in prevent many tourists from coming to the area. With the lack of tourists it creates a lack of business causing more people to more out of Ellesmere because there is no reason for them to stay there and then the shops and other services will suffer from the lack of business closing them down, in away it’s a chain reaction. If the redevelopment were to go ahead it would create more jobs, more shops and better service encouraging many people to come back to Ellesmere as well as bring in new people to come live in the local area, this would create a much stronger back bone for Ellesmere to fall back on when the tourist business is suffering. As a knock on effect the redevelopment of the Dairy site would become a lot less of an eyesore and more attractive bring in more and more tourist and also more people to live in the area. This would in turn pull Ellesmere with gathering speed up and then out of the spiral of decline making a wealth prosperous place to live.
As shown in section.3 75% of people come to Ellesmere to shop redevelopment could increase the number of people who come to Ellesmere to shop because many local people have to travel to places like Shrewsbury Wrexham and Oswestry to do the bulk of there main shopping and the more high street fashion cloths. The redevelopment with its Factory outlet shop and small supermarket may stop some of these people who travel larges distances to come and shop for there items in Ellesmere. The main attraction to Ellesmere will be the Shopping Outlet stores which will be similar to Chester shire Oaks, which is very successful. Ellesmere is in a very good poison in Shropshire in between Chester and Shrewsbury. Shrewsbury is the centre of Shropshire and is also a very prosperous area. Chester is a major city recently been voted the most beautiful city in England, this could be important because Chester is less than an hour drive from Ellesmere. If the redevelopment became a success in would be pulling people in from all over Shropshire and also it boarding counties e.g. Wrexham.
Evaluation:
For this coursework my task was to prove a hypothesis to prove that the development of the former creamery site would be good for the future of Ellesmere. Which where slit up into four main sections, shown on the previous page and below:
- Ellesmere’s need for redevelopment,
- What the proposals are for the former creamery site,
- Ellesmere current function,
- Are the proposals good for Ellesmere in the future?
I thought I would find that Ellesmere was not in need redeveloping, before I started this coursework. But after completing my field work and researching of key economical figures about Ellesmere I found that the town was falling into a deepening hole. I found this to be a shock because see Ellesmere as quiet a wealthy area but I was proved wrong also I rarely go near the dairy. Also the town centre had recently been redeveloped, so I guess that Ellesmere was prospering well.
I order to complete this coursework I need to do various different types of research:
- Field sketches of the area,
- Environmental assessments of the area,
- Unemployment information of the area,
- Photos of the area,
- Questionnaire results,
- Draw and colour in maps of Ellesmere,
- Create a range of different graphs to show my result and other research.
Having now completed my investigation I can present my overall conclusion to be in favour of the redevelopment of the former Creamery site, in Ellesmere. I could see that the Old Creamery site in derricked, dangerous and a place of unattractiveness. I have discovered that Ellesmere was heavily reliant upon there summer months when they have their largest number of tourists, rather than trade. I could there were also people moving out of Ellesmere because of the lack of jobs and the quality of some of the services. This shows that Ellesmere is increasingly losing it business, becoming derricked and losing more and more money every year. This mainly is because the tourist session varies every year which Ellesmere is highly dependent on. So if Ellesmere could be redeveloped it could increase trade giving Ellesmere’s people a reason to say and others an incentive of come to Ellesmere.
I have learnt that redevelopment of the Creamery site is not necessarily the best options for Ellesmere itself. The redevelopment could take the business out of Ellesmere’s town centre causing shops and other business to close down through lack of business in the centre this could cause this part of the town to become derricked and maybe even experience the same problems as the Dairy site is.
I thought my coursework was good because of the overall amount I writ and the way it all come together and may sense. I liked the way I used a range of different graphs and charts to show all the different result that I have collected and researched during this project. I have keped to the guidelines of the coursework given to me and built my coursework from there.
However I could have improved it by:
- Include more examples of shop’s and other locations, to strengthen my points
- Included more pictures of the Dairy site, to give a greater picture of what the area is really like.
- Done more in-depth research into what is happening to the site today. This information could be added to section 2 and 3 this would make my coursework more precise and accurate.
If I was going to do this again I would change the field sketches I did. I would have two of the town centre which is a relativity prosperous area and then to of the old Creamery site because:
- I could compare the sate of each one say why this one is better than other, why there is people there etc...
- Give people a great idea of how this site is different to the rest of Ellesmere.
- Make my reasons for redevelopment stronger.
Having completed this investigation I have come to the conclusion that:
- Ellesmere’s main business trade is slow economy eroding away.
- This is increasingly making it fall back on its tourism, which is unreliable.
- People are moving out of Ellesmere to find there jobs.
- Redevelopment could change Ellesmere’s future for the better.
- It would give and strong trading market to fall back on.
- Tourism would increase with some new developments to attack more in.
- The development could make Ellesmere a rich market and tourists, which prosperous, with out need any further aid money.
