DEVELOPMENT & PLACE

You’ve set a high bar for yourselves! What does the BID plan to do next? We’d like to progress with two important projects we’ve already started: the regeneration of the Bigg Market and attracting more investment to Northumberland Street and its surroundings. Those are two very well-known parts of the city. But, like all BIDs, your levy payers vote periodically on whether NE1 should continue. Are you confident of renewal when that happens later this year? I am, because we have an exceptionally good track record and have done all the things we set out to do, so in terms of return on investment we’ve delivered in spades. However, I can’t predict howmembers will vote on the day. If NE1 is given a mandate to continue for a third five-year term, what will success look like to you? A better-connected city with businesses working smarter and faster. A larger BID team could achieve more, but we like to show our value by levering money. For that reason, we’re not increasing or building in an escalator to the 1% levy rate. Newcastle’s Business Improvement District Company, NE1 is looking forward to an ambitious third term if local businesses agree to renew its mandate. AdrianWaddell , who recently took over the reins as Chief Executive, explains his vision for the capital of the North East, tells us why he admires Gothenburg and Hamburg and reveals his favourite UK city (outside Newcastle). How do you describe the changes taking place in Newcastle to people who aren’t that familiar with the city? I emphasise the scale of ambition here, the large number of opportunities and of course all of the development happening in the city centre. Through our membership and projects we cover pretty much every sector that’s present in the city, so I’m always delighted to meet people and help join up the dots. NE1 was formed nearly a decade ago. How do you describe the ethos of the organisation? Our aspiration is to think big and do ambitious things that change the way the city works. We’re helping to curate the evolution of Newcastle’s city centre. And which of the BID’s projects are you most proud of so far? The absolute stand-out for me in terms of leaving a legacy for the city is Alive After Five. That started in 2010 and has been transformational. It has attracted other cities who have visited us to see how they could replicate the process. Sounds interesting… tell us more. Everyone knew the city stopped around 5pm and then cranked up again about Adrian Waddell Chief Executive, NE1 INTERVIEW TYNE FOR CHANGE 8pm. We knew other cities had a longer day, with more going on, and were better as a result. So we decided to figure out how to introduce that into Newcastle in a sustainable way, that would work for our businesses. How did retailers react to the idea? They were open to our suggestions, but they needed to be persuaded. We did that by getting major retailers like John Lewis and Fenwick on board first and they were the ones who achieved the buy-in of others. It helped to have a clear proposition: the city is open for shoppers every weekday until 8pm. We also reinforced the message by providing free car parking every weekday night in the 16 council-owned multi-storey car parks from 5pm onwards. That obviously pulled in more people, but have you been able to quantify tangible benefits? Most definitely. We know to a high degree of accuracy that 20% of the city’s retail footfall is accounted for during that time period. And we have been reliably recording data since we started, so we know that the value of additional spending to date totals £839m. 10 11 CUSHMAN & WAKEFIELD DEVELOPMENT & PLACE