Business in the Community launched its Healthy High Streets initiative in 2014. The initiative provides intensive support to revitalise high streets over a three year period and involves larger businesses engaging with local town  teams.

With help from Denbighshire County Council, Prestatyn successfully applied for a Healthy High Streets initiative in 2014 and staff from Boots UK, the Co-operative Group, Marks & Spencer, Principality Building Society and Santander have subsequently been working with the local business community and the County Council and Town Council to tackle challenges, which have been jointly identified.

Over the last twelve months, improvements have been made by Denbighshire County Council to the pedestrian routes between the Shopping Park and the High Street, the town’s website has been redesigned to make it easy to access from smartphones, town centre signage has been replaced and work has started on turning the town into a dementia-friendly community.

Over the year, footfall in the town centre has increased, car park usage has gone up whilst the number of vacant shops and occurrences recorded by the police have fallen.

There is likely to be a further application round for communities where some of the national partners are already represented and which are interested in participating in the Healthy High Streets programme in summer 2016.

To find out more click on the BITC logo above.