At times of hardship all towns seems to suffer from a few empty shops and the Isle of Wight is no exception.
Down here in Ventnor, the town council are hoping that they can bring life back into the handful of empty shops.
At last week’s Ventnor Town Council (VTC) meeting, Cllr Robinson proposed that the VTC approach the landlords of all empty shops in town.
In return for cleaning windows and generally sprucing up the shop fronts, it was suggested that the Landlord allow displays in their shop windows from local artists, community groups and societies and even perhaps the town council’s Winter Gardens exhibition.
All councillors agreed it was a great idea and voted in favour of the resolution.
At the end of the meeting during public question time, a representative from the local history society agreed to liaise with the town clerk regarding landlords that the society had approached with the same idea last year.She told the meeting that they’d received no replies to any of their requests to do the same.
Hopefully the landlords will reconsider their position and realise that well kept shop fronts add to the value of the area and encourage more people to visit the town, which in turn may lead to the shops being leased.
