Already, the Darwen Town Deal has brought us the stunning restoration of Darwen Tower – revealed to thousands of residents on the moors for the Queen’s Jubilee celebrations.
And, an impressive Olympic skate park – soon to host national qualifiers for British Cycling – attracting visitors from right around the world.
Finishing touches are also being made to brand new sporting and community facilities at Darwen FC and Darwen Cricket Club too.
And, this is only the start of the ambitious five year project!
Detailed plans are being developed for the £100m transformation of the town – £25m secured through the Government’s Town Deal boosted with funding from the Council and private investors too.
The Town Deal centres around five key themes:
– Town centre regeneration
– Employment growth and business innovation
– Destination Darwen – including trails to the iconic Jubilee Tower
– Connected Darwen with ultrafast fibre broadband
– A brand new East Lancashire Sports Village
Perhaps the most talked about of the £100m Darwen Town Deal plans are those for the town centre.
While still in the very early days, Darwen Market – as its motto suggests, at the very ‘heart of the town’ – is set to benefit from millions of pounds worth of investment.
In towns similar to Darwen, ‘modern markets’ – focused around food, including the likes of Mackie Mayor, Altringham Market and Southport Market – are proving hugely successful, something that’s being looked at here too.
The move would support the town’s fantastic range of independent retailers and provide opportunities for new businesses wanting to invest in Darwen too.
Darwen’s beautiful Carnegie library and theatre could also be refurbished and perhaps even extended with opportunities for town centre living – boosting the vitality of the centre from day through to night.
The Council is currently working on a detailed process to secure a development partner to support the delivery of the major town centre projects with an aim for contractors to be on site in early 2024.
Over the coming year, there will be opportunities for businesses and residents to engage with these plans.
The town centre will also be better connected to Darwen’s rolling countryside too with new ‘Destination Darwen’ trails, including improved footpaths, linking up to the sprawling moors.
Of course, high on the agenda is investment in local employment – safeguarding and creating new jobs in the town – linking to the Council’s vision for a prosperous borough where nobody is left behind.
To help with that, the Town Deal will support Perspex International with its new £40m national manufacturing centre at Chapels with research and development facilities and new zero carbon opportunities.
Neighbouring will be a new Additive Manufacturing Accelerator, led by Sheffield University – the first-of-its-kind in the UK – building on the town’s proud manufacturing heritage.
And, there’ll be new employment growth sites too – quickly creating new business and job opportunities.
Chair of the Town Deal Board, Wayne Wild says:
Our vision is that by 2030, Darwen will be an attractive, modern maker-town that punches way above its economic weight.
There’s a real feel of momentum in the town with the successful completion of the ‘fast-track’ projects including the beautiful restoration of the Tower and the skate park too.
This is a fantastic start and gives us a real flavour of the difference the Town Deal can help make here in Darwen.
However, it’s important to remember this is a five-year project and while the £25m was awarded by Government back in July 2021, being able to access it and start to use it has required working up detailed business cases for each of the projects – no easy task.
They were confirmed by Government at the end of last year, but there’s still a lot to do before we can even start to put spades in the ground.
What’s really important is that we get it right – this is a once in a lifetime opportunity for the town – more investment than we’ve ever seen before for Darwen and we want to do something which will have a real and lasting impact.
As I’ve said before, the board is led by the mantra of the words on the Darwen coat of arms – ‘Abque Labore Nihil’ – nothing without labour.
And so, the hard work in delivering our ambitious vision for Darwen will continue, with residents and Darwen businesses at the very heart of it.
