Greenwich, Woolwich and Eltham town centres to see £2.1 million funds

Over the past week Greenwich Council have been promoting the allocation of £2.1m towards three town centres in the borough at Greenwich, Eltham and Woolwich.

It’s highlighted under their new “Getting Things Done” slogan which you may already have become bored to death by.

Well, spending £120,000 on a new communications role to promote themselves during a time of cuts has to go somewhere – and in this case it’s repeating a new slogan ad nauseam.

Whilst £2.1 million may sound impressive it’s over five years and spread across three town centres so doesn’t really leave much to play with per annum in each town. In fact in 2026/27 the grand total of £108k in each. After inflation in 2029/30 how far will that go?

In Woolwich one area of spend is to keep newly revamped areas from the last government’s Future High Streets fund clean, which is just as well as it was looking filthy weeks after installation due to a choice of design and materials that’s high maintenance.

As an aside, what’s happening with the water feature installed in General Gordon Square as part of the last expensive project before the Olympics and now switched off?

Understandable it was off when market traders were moved back to Beresford Square after an upgrade underway there (the previous barely lasted a decade) but they’ve all moved back some time ago.

Greenwich

In Greenwich they’re also revamping Cutty Sark Gardens. Yes, again.

Remember the old water feature there installed in the early 2010s and then switched off for good shortly after?

It’s a constant merry-go-round. The foot tunnel? Aside from bodged lift upgrades around 2010 all lighting then installed was subsequently never maintained – so they’ve just spent more replacing it all. This time from the UK Shared Prosperity Fund.

In Eltham they’re “hosting events to boost local tourism”.

Potential funds ignored

What’s odd about all this is why use scarce funds alone to do it rather than adopt Business Improvement Districts as seen all over London from Bexleyheath to Bromley, Brixton to Ealing and dozens more besides.

BIDs are a key way to garner funds from businesses to benefit town centres in a time of constrained funding. If Greenwich still wanted to allocate funds in addition – and that would be welcome – it’d boost the overall pot supplementing BID spending.

If BIDs are good enough for 70 areas across London why havn’t Greenwich Council pushed for one? They’re hardly new. Brixton’s is 11 years old to give one example.

In Bexleyheath recently the BID has funded market events, wrestling, an art exhibition and forthcoming Christmas events.

In Bromley businesses have just voted to renew and from 2026 to 2031 £3 million is to be spent in the town. Puts £2.1m from Greenwich across three towns for five years to shame.

They’re used generally exactly for what Greenwich are using this £2.1m for: street cleaning, putting on events and improvement works.

Developer revenue

Of the £2.1million for town centre announced in Greenwich part is derived from developer income. As Greenwich have been so poor at capturing funding from those sources it all adds up to a rather meagre pot of funds to support the main town centre.

It also raises the question of “is that it?”. With many, many new developments coming thick and fast all over Woolwich and some dismal areas remaining in the town centre on foot like Woolwich High Street outside the Waterfront, are they saying no more funds?

So is £2.1 million across three towns over five years better than nothing? Of course. But if they’d got their act together with Section 106 and the Community Infrastructure Levy a decade ago – and embraced BIDs as across London back then – they’d be plenty more money to boost and improve town centres.

And despite the best efforts of £120,000 spend on a communications director and new slogans, while welcome this money it’s not exactly transformative.

All eyes on the next allocation of funds from forthcoming major developments such as Macbean Street on the former Woolwich Poly school, the Poundstretcher site next door and Mortgrammit Square to name but three.