Whyalla Main Street

Chris D Martin
Lecturer, Business Studies, Elton Mayo School of Management, University of South Australia, SA

PP: 041 - 043

Keywords

community development program, rural development

Article Text

The 'Main Street Program' was adopted in Australia in 1989 by the NSW Department of Planning with the aim to lift the image of inner city shopping strips and make them more competitive with big retailing centres. In rapid fashion, the NSW model has been adopted in Victoria, Tasmania and South Australia. Designed to be community based, the NSW model involved five elements:

• Community organisation
• Urban design
• Heritage conservation
• Business development
• Promotion of the community.

The aim of the program, at least at the suburban level, was the reinvigoration of older shopping strips. Other groups saw it as a way to reinforce broader planning objectives such as decentralisation and the development of tourism opportunities (Heritage Conservation News 1989). The preliminary results reported in NSW, at least for the more successful ventures, have been an increase in local turnover, improved community links and an improvement in the built environment of the main streets in the towns where the program has been running.

In South Australia, the Office of Business and Regional Development defines the Main Street Program as a process to assist communities revitalise their laws and commercial centres; it is a self-help program aimed at developing the skills that will make communities self-sufficient, economically viable and vibrant.

The South Australian Government commenced the Main Street in 1994 with a budget allocation of $250,000, and promises of further annual allocations of $250,000 (Advertiser 23/4/94). Subsequent allocations boosted the 1993/94 figure to $355,000. Individual councils could apply for seeding grants of up to $20,000 with subsequent requests for funding being considered.

The criteria for the allocation of funds were: that the area was experiencing economic decline; that there was a potential for long term gains to the community from the process; that a clear market positioning for the area could be established and that the cultural or heritage assets of the area were able to be used for the social or economic benefit of the community. In addition, a Main Street committee had to have been formed and that could provide a long term vision and demonstrate long term commitment to the area (Office of Business and Regional Development 1993).

The South Australian model showed many of the same objectives of the New South Wales model with the State Government announcing the objectives of the Program as to:

• Develop or redevelop the downtown parts of metropolitan or country commercial centres
• Create jobs by carrying out the work necessary or as a consequence of improved trading
• Improve the appearance of the main streets
• Encourage self-help development and community involvement (Advertiser 23/4/93).

There was one major difference, however. The list of objectives was increased with the inclusion of the second object, namely, a reference to job creation. This was not surprising in a State with a stubbornly high unemployment rate and a looming state election. (Industry Commission 1994).

The earliest main street committees in South Australia were formed in the suburban councils of Unley, Norwood, Thebarton, Prospect and Glenelg. Regional cities that were successful in attracting funds were Penola and Burra, as part of the Historic Towns Program and in recognition of their tourist potential and Clare, Jamestown, Peterborough and Whyalla because of their importance to rural communities (Advertiser 4/10/93). Later, programs commenced in Port Augusta. In similar fashion to the New South Wales model, the South Australian programs required the formation of a committee of persons representing various interest groups, the council, traders and community groups. The seed funding from the government, subject to limits, then paid for the employment of a co-ordinator. Further funding depended upon either council support, a levy on retailers, an extension of the seeding grant or a mixture of all three.

In November 1993, the Whyalla Main Street Committee, which began initially as an interim sub-committee of the Whyalla Council, approached the University of South Australia to seek help in planning and implementing a market research study. A research group within the Whyalla Campus, the Centre for Remote Area Studies (CRAS) was commissioned by the committee to determine citizen attitudes towards the city of Whyalla and its two main streets - Patterson and Forsyth Streets. A secondary objective was to discover, what the citizens valued about the city in which they lived. The survey of citizen attitudes was an exploratory one designed as a first step to gain information and so facilitate further decision-making by the Main Street Committee.

Survey results

The respondent group believed that the best features on the City of Whyalla were its climate and resulting lifestyle (Table 1).

When the survey sought more specific information the respondent group indicated that the best features of the city that should be preserved were the city's parks, particularly the Ada Ryan Gardens (58%), the city's original style houses (11%) and its friendly nature (11%). Various (other) responses showed a wide range of ideas. When asked what set the city apart from all others, 33% of the respondents indicated that they believed it was Whyalla's people and their friendliness. The presence of BHP Steelworks was mentioned by 27% of the respondents. A long list of 'other' responses account for the remaining 40% responses.

Activities sought for the Main Street and proposed improvements

When asked of what kinds of activities that they would like to see developed in the main streets the respondent group indicated:

The high value placed on the supermarket expressed the obvious to policy makers. The larger retail chains were absent from the main shopping precinct, largely due to lack of space. They were situated at three other scattered locations throughout Whyalla and at the larger Westlands complex, some kilometres from the main street precinct. The absence of places to meet in an alfresco environment or tree-scaping also shows the priority of the residents' views. This is not surprising considering the success of other such tree-scaping at other country towns such as Port Augusta and Quorn.

Discussion

In Whyalla the Main Street program is still in the embryonic stage and is undergoing an evolutionary unfolding with the appointment of an activities officer. Architects have been appointed with a brief to design a street plan. The Main Street Committee has recommended a small levy to fund the salary of the activities officer and to fund further promotional work. The exploratory research that this paper reports has provided the Main Street Committee with some broadly defined community issues about the two main streets and this information has been given to the architects. In addition, the survey data did give some priority to pass on some of the images held by the citizens and their concerns for their city. A major challenge facing the architects will be to translate these values identified by the survey into an appropriate image for a regional based industrial city.

The early hopes of the program have partly been overtaken by other events in the city. The city's other major shopping development at Westlands underwent significant upgrading with the inclusion of an additional supermarket plus a large food hall. These were two features ranked highly in the survey. In an ironic twist it is the big retailers that have gained the most in the city by reacting quickly to the advent of the main street program. Within the City Council there are conflicts over policy direction which has caused the Council to send mixed signals - eg proposing to move the Council offices out of the main street precinct and to the area adjacent to Westlands complex. Such a move would send a signal amounting to a loss of confidence in the viability of main street shopping complex and could devalue the main street shopping precinct. This is surprising given the hopes of job creation in the program and the fact that the Council is supporting unemployment programs for unemployed youth elsewhere in the City.

Within the group of main street traders most feel there are conflicts over priorities, the allocation of resources and future direction of the Council (Whyalla News 4/4/95). At present there is little binding the main street traders together and the reported 800 people they employ other than a supposed shared vision. After some 18 months, however, the vision is looking somewhat blurred. In practice this has meant a small number of traders retiring from the area of the main street - either by liquidation or choice. Again, inattention to an image of the main street by the small traders has caused negative perceptions since three store-fronts remain empty as at the time of writing this paper. Job creation was one of the states hopes of the program but, at this early stage, this policy objective has not yet eventuated primarily because of the competitive response by the Westlands' management. The visions of the Main Street program are not yet reality. Early hopes are slipping on the internal conflicts over strategic direction and resource issues. What is needed now is more nerve by the traders and, perhaps, a sharper understanding of dealing with competition.

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