July 2018 Update from Cleveleys Coastal Community Team (CCT) What's happening and what's being looked at.

If you’d like to help to make Cleveleys better than average, please get in touch with Jane Littlewood. Email: jane@theRabbitPatch.co.uk Phone 07932 143431

It’s been a busy 6 months since our last update and a number of the projects which the CCT has been working on will be coming to fruition any time now. Some of the things in this update might already be completed by the time you read it. We’re sure you’ll agree that our town is looking much better!

Join the Big Cleveleys Clean Up - 2018

Last year the Coastal Community Team started its work off with a big clean-up day. Well this year it’s back!

The school holidays and Blackpool Illuminations season is a busy time in Cleveleys, so we want the place to look ship-shape and Bristol fashion for everyone who comes here.

Please come along and help! We’ll be splitting into teams to weed, sweep, litter pick and tidy, all over the town.

Tuesday 7 August at 10am. Equipment provided (feel free to bring your own if you prefer). More online, just search ‘Care for Cleveleys’

A new noticeboard for Cleveleys!

Many, many thanks go to Mike Allison from WEC Group. (An engineering company, they make CCTV poles among other things). They’ve donated and manufactured this community noticeboard.

You’ll remember that his wife Lisa, who works at Santander, volunteered him! It’s being installed any time now, and will be sited outside the Vodaphone shop in a central, busy position where it will be seen by the most number of people. Local information will go on one side and the other used for event notices. Various members of the CCT will have a key to make displaying community notices easy.

It’s finished in green to match the rest of the painting in the town.

We can’t stress how generous it was of WEC to donate this noticeboard. Not only will it be very useful, but with a value of a few thousand pounds it also represents a significant saving to the funds. Thank you also to the engineering team at Wyre Council for installing it.

Bus Station

Improvements are starting to happen in the bus station! The CCT paid for it to be jet washed out of the grant. The ‘Bus Station’ sign was cleaned at the same time and it’s also being repainted any time now.

Wyre Council are covering the cost of cleaning down and priming the yellow legs which hold up the roof, ready for Steve and his HMP Kirkham lads to repaint them. They will still be yellow so that anyone with a visual impairment can see them clearly. The HMP team are also going to repaint the benches – in green of course!

Students from Blackpool and the Fylde College have created a concept for a street map which is going to fill the back wall. At the time of writing, converting their idea into full-size finished artwork is on the desk at The Rabbit Patch. It’s going to be printed onto big panels which will be fastened onto the wall.

PLEASE put rubbish in the bins in the bus station – and please don’t feed the pigeons there!

Do you know anything about the history of the bus station? If you do please get in touch and tell us.

Next steps: Painting the poles, benches and sign, plus completion of the street plan artwork, manufacture and installation of the sign.

The Clock Shelter

Last year had trundled on to winter before anything was done about painting the clock shelter, so this job was shelved for 2018. This year it’s looking quite sorry for itself.

The CCT has covered the cost of jet washing it and paid for paint and materials out of the grant.

The brilliant Steve and his HMP Kirkham team are going to repaint it. Yes, you guessed, it’s going to be green!

They won’t be able to do the clock bit at the top as it needs a cherry picker for high access.

Can you help out? The painting will be done at the end of August.

Town Centre Team

The Town Centre Team has carried on with their amazing work and Cleveleys is looking well looked after and cared for. They’ve carried on weeding, sweeping and gardening, and the central area of Cleveleys is looking so much better as a result. Please come along and join in – you’ll make great friends and having a laugh is guaranteed!

Next Dates: 7 August, 4 September, 2 October, 30 October, 27 November, 18 December - 10am, Rotary clock at Nutter Road.

We Care for Cleveleys!

It’s brilliant to see businesses getting involved in looking after Cleveleys.

A number of you have been a big help in saving the day by watering the planters, some of you have helped with materials and equipment, and others have fed and watered volunteers!

There’s been a lot of building maintenance work over the last few months and most premises look nice.

It matters that everyone plays a part in working together to look after Cleveleys. Whatever you do matters - it all adds up to make our town look cared for and valued. And that’s what makes people come back to shop here!

Would you like a window sticker?

To recognise all your efforts the CCT has produced a window sticker for you to display and show everyone that you’re part of the team. We’d like to see them in shops, offices, businesses, schools and cars, so that everyone can see that everyone is working together to make Cleveleys better than average!

Lots of us do lots of things in different ways that all add up to make Cleveleys great. It doesn’t matter how large or small you act of thoughtfulness is, because everything that you do adds up to make a much greater whole, keep Cleveleys vibrant and prevent our town centre from failing.

Post what you’ve done in the Care for Cleveleys Facebook group, or email jane@theRabbitPatch.co.uk. We’ll include your business in the roll call on Visit Cleveleys, and include a photo in the online gallery if you provide one.

Planters

Dobbies Garden Centre at Kirkham very generously donated a substantial amount of plants to top up the big grey pots this Spring.

They gave a mixture of alpine and perennial plants, the intention being that the plants will establish themselves and fill the pots throughout most of the year.

Would you believe that it wasn’t long after they’d been planted that the heatwave struck, but a number of shops and individuals came up trumps and helped out with watering, delivering it in milk bottles, pop bottles and all kinds of containers.

Wyre Council have now put our planters on their watering rota, so many thanks to the lads with the bowser for saving the day!

PLEASE don’t use them as ashtrays and litter bins! There are plenty of bins for everyone’s litter!

Next steps: Weeding and maintenance and carrying on looking after the planters.

Bollards and finger posts

You’ll remember that Steve and his team from HMP Kirkham repainted the bollards and finger posts last summer. The Coastal Community Team paid for the paint and materials out of the grant fund.

If you spot any that have been missed or scuffed up, or any benches etc which need painting (like the two outside the NatWest) please let us know.

They’re going to catch all the odds and ends during the summer.

Next steps: HMP are coming back to finish odds and ends of street furniture when they come back to do the clock shelter.

Events and Markets

The CCT doesn’t currently have the capacity or resources to organise events. You have probably read about the suggestion of a weekly market on Facebook. The CCT has been working with Wyre Council (and LCC) for months to try and find a way to hold a market in the town. An initial trial is to be carried out in late summer, with stalls on the Plaza area at the seaward end of Victoria Road West. Wyre Council will be organising it, at the invitation of the CCT.

Busking

The team are still looking for ways to make Cleveleys an attractive place, the first destination people think of when they're looking for something to do.

‘Busking’ (which could include all kinds of art forms) creates a happy atmosphere where people have a great time and want to come back.

Music lightens the mood, slows people down and makes you feel happy - and happy people are more likely to spend money - and then come back another day!

The CCT will be inviting local community performers, choirs, musicians, theatrical groups, dance troupes etc to busk in Cleveleys.

Where they choose to busk will be at their own discretion.

Support for Retailers

The CCT receive all kinds of information about all manner of things. We hear about support for businesses, access to free support and training, and many things which could be useful to you and your own business. We’d like to be able to pass this information on so that anyone who wants to take advantage of it can do so.

For example, in January 2019 Blackpool and the Fylde College students will be going out on work placements. Students in IT, business, marketing and more will all be looking for placements. These students could be helping to

sort out your emails, your website, Facebook page and so much more. And it’s FREE. Matching begins now and the best students will get snapped up first.

We also find out about things that are happening in the area which may affect your business. And we also want to tell you about what we are doing to make Cleveleys better for you.

The only reliable way that we currently have of letting the majority of business owners know what’s happening in Cleveleys is to hand deliver a printed letter, which isn’t practical.

Please get in touch with your email address and then we can add you to the mailing list.

Well Done Northfold School

Our little helpers at Northfold have been stars this year!

They’ve come along to Town Centre Team clean ups, spread the word through their school community and even tried to educate smokers about where to put their tab ends!

In the last week of term they went out to look at the signage around town and establish what should go and what’s missing.

In recognition of their work both with the CCT and the Rossall Beach Group, they were selected as the WINNERS of a NATIONAL competition, sponsored by Costa Coffee.

Out of 400 nominees they were selected as the Litter Heroes Winner in the Police Community Clubs of Great Britain, Community Education Award

Find out More and Get Involved.

Retail is changing, that much is certain. Out of town shopping, supermarkets and of course the internet is changing the way that people spend money. Overheads, rent and rates are a concern for all retailers. Town centres all over the UK are feeling the pinch from. Cleveleys CCT are trying to make Cleveleys better than average to help our town to resist that decline - rather than waiting for it to become a ghost town and not being able to do anything about it.

Please join the Care for Cleveleys Facebook group

It’s the official 'community hub' for the Cleveleys Coastal Community Team. It’s where we share news about what’s happening, plus carry out consultation by seeking opinions, holding surveys, and talking to each other to work together as a strong team - www.facebook.com/groups/CareforCleveleys

-Updates are regularly posted on the Visit Cleveleys website – there’s a link on the homepage at www.visitCleveleys.co.uk

-Join the ‘Busking in Cleveleys’ Facebook group at www.facebook.com/groups/BuskinginCleveleys

Contact: Jane Littlewood on 07932 143431 or by email jane@theRabbitPatch.co.uk Kathryn Oakes at Wyre Council on 01253 887282 or by email Kathryn.oakes@wyre.gov.uk If you would like to help the Town Centre Team ring Dorothy Ford on 01253 865494