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12 September 2006

“Scenarios for Southend - 2017”

Southend Together Board

12th September 2006

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12 September 2006

Health Warning!

• The information contained in this document has been prepared for illustrative purposes only and does not represent any plans or intent for the Southend Community or its service providers.

• As such this document MUST NOT be used outside this context.

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12 September 2006

Introduction

• Southend Together is in the process of a fairly rapid evolution, with development of a new operating structure, the development of a Local Area Agreement (LAA) for Southend and latterly the initiation of work to develop a Sustainable Community Strategy (SCS)

• As discussed on a number occasions, the order in which these tasks has been address it not been out of choice, with the need to develop an LAA before SCS driven by the needs of the LAA planning cycle.

• In the event Southend Together does not have a vision, which has been developed and is owned by the partnership, from which the key elements of the SCS can be constructed. Though some earlier work with the Southend Together Board has provided a foundation for developing a vision statement.

• In order to help move this process on the Southend Together Executive, at their meeting in July requested a range of potential scenarios be developed for the Southend Community from which the Southend Together Board could develop its own desired future direction or vision.

• In effect the scenarios provide a start point for the strategic debate about what Southend could become in say 10 years time.

• This document outlines the process used to develop the scenarios and the steps to completed by the Southend Together Board to develop a ‘first cut’ vision or directional statement.

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Development of the Scenarios

• Following the July Southend Together Executive meeting a range of potential scenarios have been developed for Southend as a community.

• In developing the scenarios a number reference documents were reviewed and a brief ‘State of Southend’ document was prepared which highlighted a number of key factor impacting on Southend. – See attachment 1.

• The approach used to develop these scenarios was based on a process of identifying a list of potential (largely) external issues, which could impact on the Southend Community.

• This was not seen as an exhaustive list, but one which highlight a range of risks and opportunities for the Southend Community.

• This list was further refined by considering their like potential impact and likelihood of happening, in order to help focus on the core issues for the scenarios.

• The next page contains the summary output from this activity.

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Issue Matrix

Impact and Likelihood Assessment

High

Low

Opportunities AirportTown centre sitesDevelopment sitesLower Thames crossing

ThreatsAirport

Opportunities Deprived wardsCrime / fear of crimeSeafront developmentGovernance changesICT / new technology

ThreatsHealth of communitySkills base / educational qualificationsExternal perceptionAffordable housingRoadsCouncilEnergy availability / cost

Opportunities Rail RiverMigrationCentre of cultural / educational excellenceSaxon KingEurope

ThreatsSport facilitiesClimate changeWater provision

Opportunities Population growthCoastal townUniversity2012 OlympicsRegional CitiesCultural diversity

ThreatsDemographic projectionsBusiness retention, inward investment,

SME start upWaste managementShell Haven

LowHigh

Mitigate

Exploit

Extract quick wins

Monitor and respond

Don’t bother, also possibly

outside timescale

Risk manage

Can they be influenced?*

* Statements to highlight general options for addressing the classified risks and opportunities.

LIKELIHOOD

IMPACT

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12 September 2006

Scenarios for Southend

• The next stage was to identify a range of potential scenarios for the Southend Community.

• This process identified four possible scenarios. In reality these provide a start point for further discussion, as the range of potential or eventual outcomes for the Southend Community is numerous and varied.

• The scenarios developed are not mutually exclusive and are designed to capture a balance of how external factors could influence the future Southend Community and what Southend Together could make change happen.

• As such they should be regarded a illustrations or caricatures from which a shared outcome can be developed which is both desirable and realistic.

• At the core of each of the identified scenarios is a semi high level demographic profile for the Southend Community and their anticipated key needs.

• A pen picture has also been prepared for each of the scenarios to help illustrate how the possible future would look and feel - See attachment 2.

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Scenarios for Southend

• The four scenarios are;

– Retirement Centre

– Commuter Town

– Visitor Centre (including cultural)

– Regional Centre (including education)

• The issues, exacted from the matrix on page 5, which are the most relevant to each of the scenarios are highlighted on the following slides

• Those issues market with a (T) denote particularly ‘thorny’ issues that would need to be addressed.

• The issues slides were then used to help compile the individual pen pictures.

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12 September 2006

Visitor Centre - Resort

High Impact – High Like

• Deprived Wards• Crime• Seafront Development• Roads• External perceptions (T)• Council – good services (T)

High Impact – Low likelihood

• Town centre development (T)

Low impact – High likelihood

• Costal Town• Olympics 2012• Business Centre• Casino/conference centres etc…

Low Impact - Low likelihood

• Saxon King• Sports facilities – gearing them

towards meeting visitor centre.• Cultural facilities.

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12 September 2006

Retirement Centre

High Impact - High Probability

• Low fear of crime• Good health and community facilities• Deprived wards – improve (T)• Seafront development?• External perceptions (T)• Council – good social services – service priorities (T)

High Impact – Low Likelihood

• Town centre developments (T)

High likelihood – Low impact

• Costal Town

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Regional Centre / Functional Urban Area

High Impact - High Likelihood

• Deprived Wards (T)• Seafront Development• Governance• ICT• Skills base (T)• Health • Roads (T)• Affordable Housing• External Perception• Council – good services (T)

High Impact - Low Likelihood

• Airport• Town Centre sites• Lower Thames Crossing

Low Impact – High Likelihood

• University• Business retention • -Waste• Regional Centre

Low Impact – Low Likelihood

• Migration (T)• Sports/Leisure facilities• Water provision

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12 September 2006

Commuter Town

High importance - High Likelihood

• Deprived wards – improve• ICT developments – home working• Skill base/ed qualifications.• Roads (T)• External perceptions? (T)• Council (education) (T)

High Impact – Low likelihood

• Airport• Town Centre development (T)• Housing• University

Low Impact - Low likelihood

• Rail

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Where are we going?

• When considering the scenarios it should be recognised that they are being used to illustrate and characterise the Southend Community from different perspectives.

• Whilst they are subjective in nature they do provide a basis articulating current perceptions of ‘possible’ directions for the Southend Community.

• Thinking about Southend as a community it is recognised that over the next decade changes will be brought about by a mix of external factors, which are largely outside the control of Southend Together partners, and internal factors over which partners have some influence.

• The following slides illustrate how the scenarios can be used to recognise this duality of the change process

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Regional CentreVisitor Centre

Retirement CentreCommuter Town

Over the next decade there will be a ‘natural’ tendency for that mix to change. This will be a result of current plans, programmes of activity, prevailing chances and significant one off events, illustrated by the yellow / lighter shape. Again this is just a hypothetical view.

2017

Where are we now and likely to evolve, naturally? (illustrative)

2006

In reality the Southend Community is a mix of the four scenarios. The green / darker shape is simply a hypothetical view of the current position

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However Southend Together Board may wish to see a different mix, by placing more or less emphasis on particular scenarios.

How we may wish to see Southend evolve? (illustrative)

2017

Regional CentreVisitor Centre

Retirement CentreCommuter Town

Achieving Southend Together’s desired outcome may therefore require refocusing of existing priorities and the establishment of new programmes of activity. It should also be recognised that it will not be possible to achieve all desired outcomes on the basis that some prevailing trends are too significant to address.

2017

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How Southend may evolve in reality? (illustrative)

Commuter Town Retirement Centre

Visitor Centre Regional Centre

…….with the broad direction being a achieved, but not exactly as envisaged.

2017

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Southend Together Development Process

• The Southend Together Board are asked to consider the future direction for the Southend Community which will need to be underpinned by the Sustainable Community Strategy and the board members individual organisational plans.

• The proposed steps to help them do this are as follows:

– Review the pen pictures for each of the scenarios.

– Consider the current position, likely future position and desired future position for the Southend Community

– Identify potential contributions to achievement of the desired future position.

– Review and iterate the achievability of the desired ambition.

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Southend Together Development Process

• The aim of this meeting is to establish a broad consensus of “desirable and achievable” outcome for the Southend Community

• It should be recognised that this is a relatively open ended process with allows people to engage on the broader debate about how the Southend Community could, should or might develop.

• As such it is likely to be the start of a conversation rather than a process which leads to a refined outcome at the end of this session. The process itself will probably surface areas of common ground, though it is just a likely to expose differences of view that need to be worked through.

• Given that the ST Board meets on a quarterly basis it would be helpful to consider how the process can be taken forward between meetings, perhaps via the Executive or a small working group