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1. Introduction

1.1 Southsea Town Centre is one of the city’s designated town centres. This Area Action Plan has been prepared to address the decrease in footfall that the centre has experienced in recent years and the likely impact that significant retail proposals in the city centre will have on Southsea Town Centre. In response to the changes the town centre will be facing, Southsea will need to redefine itself, creating a clear identity for the centre so as to protect and develop the businesses located there. Southsea must deliver an offer that drives footfall and delivers customer loyalty. This Area Action Plan sets a vision for the town centre’s future role and sets policies to guide its development. It covers a period of ten years from its date of adoption. The Action Plan covers the whole town centre extending from Osborne Road to Marmion Road including Palmerston Road, Clarendon Road & Kent Road. Map 1 shows the boundary for the Area Action Plan.

1.2 Southsea Town Centre forms part of the Council’s three-centre retail strategy, which is separate from and has a different purpose from the retail hierarchy defined in the Portsmouth City Local Plan, and which focuses on the city centre and Gunwharf Quays as well as Southsea. The aim is to promote the city as a retail destination with three different shopping centres, highlighting their individual roles and what they each offer. The different role of each centre is as follows:

• City Centre – mainstream shopping, entertainment and leisure, restaurants and bars, employment and living. Caters for local residents and also people within the sub region.
• Southsea – specialist shops / boutiques, restaurants, leisure events and the seafront. Caters mainly for local residents, tourists and also the sub region.
• Gunwharf Quays – shopping (factory outlets), heritage, leisure, restaurants and bars. Caters for local residents and tourists.

1.3 There have been several stages of preparation for this Area Action Plan. Initial consultation was carried out in July – October 2005 to set out the issues facing the town centre and to define broad options for its future. Further consultation was carried out during February – March 2006 on a set of preferred policy options for the area. The document was then revised to contain draft policies for Southsea Town Centre and was submitted to the Secretary of State for examination in September-October 2006 and a further stage of consultation occurred at the same time. This was followed by consultation on an omission site, which was proposed through the representations received. All of the representations received at this stage were considered by a Planning Inspector, who was appointed by the Secretary of State to examine the draft plan. The changes recommended by the Inspector were produced in the form of a binding report and have since been incorporated into this final version of the Area Action Plan. This Area Action Plan is therefore partly the result of the previous consultations.

1.4 Southsea Town Centre Area Action Plan is one of the new policy documents produced under the new planning system (known as development plan documents) and forms part of the Portsmouth Local Development Framework, which will over time replace the Portsmouth City Local Plan 2001-2011. An Area Action Plan is used to provide a planning framework for areas where change is expected or needed. One of the main purposes of such plans is to stimulate and help deliver regeneration. This Area Action Plan forms the statutory planning framework for Southsea Town Centre and will be used to guide future development of the centre and to determine any planning applications in the town centre. The Area Action Plan specifically replaces polices SJ5 (Southsea Principal Retail Area) and SJ6 (Southsea Secondary Retail Area) within the Portsmouth City Local Plan. Appendix 1 sets out the relationship between this plan and other development plan documents or “saved policies”. Map 2a is an extract from the adopted Portsmouth City Local Plan proposals map and Map 2b is the new proposals map which shows how the Area Action Plan changes the adopted proposals map.

Associated documents:

  Map 1: Boundary of Area Action Plan  (0.29 MB)
Map 2a: Extract from adopted Portsmouth City Local Plan proposals map  (0.23 MB)
Map 2b: New proposals map  (0.30 MB)