Tynwald Mills Planning Statement Duplicate

13th October 2015.

Tynwald Mills Planning Application number 15/01276/B

Tynwald Mills is an established retail centre that is well regarded by its customers and the wider Island community. In 2015 we were voted 'Company of The Year' in Isle of Man Newspaper Awards in Excellence. The award noted the businesses ability to adapt and prosper in a very dynamic retail and uncertain economic environment. Tynwald Mills draws its customer base from across the whole Island, we presently have 15,000 customers signed up to our loyalty programme and this core customer base represents over a third of our total turnover. We have had to learn to sell more things to less people.

We currently employ over one hundred people on the site at Tynwald Mills.

Tynwald Mills has, we accept, developed incrementally over the years. The retail business grew on the back of the growth in the wider economy, in particular the financial sector, we were left with few options as both the manufacturing and tourist (craft) industries had seen steep decline. That current development we like to think is sensitive to the environment and our neighbours and meets a real need, and a need that could not be satisfied in Douglas the primary retail area.

A departmental store is a critical part of the marketing mix in any locality, cherished by local customers but evolved from a different era. In short, outside of the main cities in the UK, departmental stores only now exist where the store holds the freehold, bought and paid for, that is pays no rent. For example, the likes of Volsins in Jersey which was founded in 1837.

When we laid out our plans in 1990's the internet was still an idea yet to be tested, the off shore financial sector was still growing strongly ... Our retail sales peaked in 2009, internet retailing was by then growing fast and the local Isle of Man economy restructuring. We would estimate that domestic retail sales for the Isle of Man have fallen by 25% over a five-year period, through a combination of internet disruption, the banking crisis and the UK raid on our VAT income.

Clearly as a retail business we needed to respond to this challenge. We broadened our offer, improved our service levels and reengineered every part of our business from a cost perspective. Broadening our offer, we needed to improve the leisure element as part of the retailing mix, that is the new world. We had to replace till queues with fashion shows and full margin sales with discounts, and coffee with Latte.

Tynwald Mills was granted planning permission at appeal for a marquee in the overflow carpark for summer periods, Easter to October inclusive, on the 6th November 2001. We did erect a marquee on an event by event basis following this decision but for reasons of budget we did not erect a marquee for the whole of the permitted summer period. As we moved into 2008 we sought to renew the permission on a similar basis to the initial application, this application was also sent to appeal and permission granted.

We understand that our applications and development have tested planning policy, it tested the Strategic Plan in requiring retail development to be directed to the existing centres, it challenged the local plan to a degree in wanting to retain a rural feel to the St Johns area.

The current local St John's plan dates back to 1999, whilst we would not argue its principals still hold true, we would argue that a 2020 interpretation is required. Without change Tynwald Mills would have been a derelict site like many places on the Island.

The Strategic Plan produced more recently in 2007 is also based on assumptions that need updating. We would not argue again, that the basic principal of directing retail development to the existing centres is correct, indeed Tynwald Mills are one of the largest private investors in retail in Douglas town centre with ten million invested to date. Developing such stores in Strand Street as Next, River Island and more recently Top Shop and TT merchandise store in Duke Street. The departmental store concept wouldn't be commercially viable in such primary areas, indeed most of independent retail is challenged by the present economic conditions as recent closures have proved.

We believe that in developing Tynwald Mills there have been compromises but the gains 'have it' in the eyes of most of the people that visit the site.

In 2013 I met with the guys behind skate Isle of Man, two years previously they had operated a Christmas ice rink in Douglas in the Villa Marina Gardens, the event had dropped away because of costs despite significant financial and moral support from sponsors. I tried in vain to resurrect the event in Douglas by tweaking and pushing costs but it was not to be, the efforts failed on the 30K rent bill required by the Villa Marina to use the gardens for the month of December.

I could see the demand from social media and took the decision to have a go at delivering a Christmas ice rink at Tynwald Mills nearly four years ago. Poker Stars backed the effort to the tune of 30K. We proceeded on the basis of a temporary structure, rented from the UK. This is an expensive operation but the people came and with the help of Poker Stars the event raised money for charity and covered its costs, not least of which was £1k a week electricity bill.

The rented marquee option was not sustainable and a suitable marquee was difficult to source at the right price, the nature of an ice rink means that the frame works best without a central pole found in most marquees. We eventually sourced a suitable marquee, that was slightly shorter in length than marquee we had permission for but significantly wider, again to suit the ice rink operation. Around and around is a lot safer than up and down on ice skates.

We have operated an ice rink from this site for two years, this year we hoped to make it a third. Last year just short of 9,000 people came ice skating including all of the Islands senior schools as a school trips for final year students.

We acknowledge that in installing a larger than agreed marquee and not dismantling post-Christmas we contravened planning regulations, we apologised then and again now.

We submitted a planning application in November 2015, the application sought permission to regularise the current arrangements, that is to keep the marquee up all year and not just during the 7 summer months as with our current permission. Our argument was that the new marquee was expensive and difficult to dismantle and given its size would remain in situ in the field protected by Harris fencing, a less than ideal situation. We proposed in conditions that we would not use the marquee during the period from the ice skating close in January till Easter mirroring to a large degree our current permission. Further we did not seek permanent permission but a five-year licence given the temporary nature of the marquee. Having submitted our retrospective planning application in November 2015 and supplementary information by way of a traffic survey in March we heard nothing until last Monday over seven months following our last submission of information and nearly a year following our initial application.

We realise that our situation and our marquee do not fit into a regulation category, certainly regulations that are in part twenty years old. We do feel like we are founder members of the too hard to deal with pile.

In scrutinising our application planning officers have focused on

Traffic;

Any difficulty with the local road network was raised and discounted at previous applications, the road network isn't ideal, but it is part of the character of the area, the road network works and critically the Department of Infrastructure have not objected to any of our applications as far back as 2001. The Christmas period is busier than any other period at Tynwald Mills, but the number of cars on site at peak now is well below 2008 levels.

The Isle of Man local economy is very different now from then, planning assumptions take no account of that currently.

The Ice rink operation also has the effect of spreading customer flow throughout the day, there are only at maximum 150 people on the ice at once on pre-booked slots from 9.00am in the morning till 7.00pm in the evening during peak days.

Noise and disturbance to the neighbours;

We are very conscious of our impact on the local area and our neighbours at any time, the ice rink has no impact as to noise nothing can be heard beyond the curtilage of the field and we continually monitor the situation last year we notified all neighbours individually as to schedules of our operation.

We suggested conditions that limited the operating times of the marquee to that of the shop with the exception of six evening events per year.

Visual impact

There is no hiding a large marquee, the marquee cannot be seen directly by any neighbours from their houses. The facility is important to the future vitality of the whole of Tynwald Mills operation, a failing Tynwald Mills would with dilapidated buildings have a great impact on the visual amenity of the area.