Shining a light on our town centre and creating different reasons to visit

Town centres are changing, with many trying to stay relevant in the face of shifting shopping habits, lower footfall and the loss of many high street names. It is clear that town centres need to offer more than just shopping in the future if they are to remain the hub of our town and a place that business can thrive. 

The Town Centre Reset is a council initiative to providing more and differing reasons to visit Ashford Town Centre, encourage active and healthy lifestyles, and introduce informal play opportunities and enhanced public spaces that make attractive places to meet and spend time. 

Over the past few summers, parts of Ashford Town Centre have looked a little different as temporary new seating, furnishings and bunting decorated upper Bank Street and Middle Row, offering integrated play, temporary public realm and outdoor seating.

Feature lighting

Now another scheme is shining a light on the Lower High Street, bringing a bit of colour, fun and something a little bit different with several trees now displaying feature lighting, which will bring some animation to the area.

The lighting will be used Thursday to Sunday evenings all-year round, plus for some events there will be colourful lighting displays when they will be on for longer periods.

Events could include VE Day, Pride, Black History Month, Diwali, Remembrance Sunday and in the run up to Christmas, complementing the Christmas lights in the lower high street during November and December.

Lighting up this part of the town will help with safety concerns and is in direct response to trader’s feedback. We have replaced the lights to look after the health of the trees and the new lights allow the trees to expand and this covers a three-year maintenance period.

The new feature lighting was paid for through government funding and section 106 developer contributions from the Designer Outlet and The Range developments. This is funding allocated specifically for spending on town centres and is not funded through local taxpayers.

Different reasons to visit

The recently expanded United Makers of Kent Food and Creative Market is held on the first Saturday of every month is growing in popularity, and a children's train-themed play area is proving a big hit with youngsters and providing different reasons for families to visit and spend time in town.

This joins other well-established events like The UnFRAMED Mural Festival last spring, the Ashford Food and Drink Festival in the Summer, Create Music Village in the Autumn and Carnival of the Baubles in Winter, which all drew in thousands of visitors.