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Stratford Renaissance Partnership's second annual conference

Posted: 04,03,09

PowerPoint presentations are now available for download.

Stratford Renaissance Partnership held its second annual conference on Thursday 26th February 2009 at Stratford Old Town Hall. The conference, entitled ‘Stratford Moving Forward’, attracted over 180 delegates from a range of local, regional and national organisations, all with a shared interest in the future of Stratford. The conference provided an opportunity to learn more about the major projects planned for or taking place in Stratford, including Stratford City and the development of the Olympic Park.

The conference was chaired by SRP’s chairman, Sir Christopher Benson who welcomed delegates and talked about the need for momentum to ensure that the changes planned for Stratford can be implemented in a timely manner.

Alison Young, Chief Executive of SRP made the opening presentation which covered the economic vision for Stratford and the importance of creating "one integrated place" which builds on the area's cultural heritage and vibrant communities.

Mayor of Newham, Sir Robin Wales spoke about Stratford’s role as a new metropolitan centre for east London, and made announcements about the new retail academy which will be developed as part of Stratford City.

John Burton, UK Development Director of Westfield Shopping Towns Ltd gave an update on progress on the construction of Stratford City, including the new John Lewis, Marks and Spencer and shopping mall. The scheme is on target for opening in 2011, and other retailers will be announced throughout this year. 

Rob Johnson, Project Director from Lend Lease, gave an update on the construction of the Athletes Village, which will be developed as a series of highly sustainable neighbourhoods taking full advantage of Stratford’s unrivalled public transport links.

The session ended with Ian Short, Deputy Chief of Executive of London Thames Gateway Development Corporation who gave an outline of some other major projects taking place in Stratford, including High Street 2012 and the development of a new Higher Education campus in Central Stratford by Birkbeck College and the University of East London.

The second morning session started with Howard Shiplee, Head of Construction from the Olympic Delivery Authority who spoke about progress with the construction of the Olympic park and associated infrastructure.

Tom Russell, Group Director of Olympic Legacy updated the conference on the Legacy Masterplan Framework which is currently out to public consultation and which will guide the development of the Park post Games. Bill Hanway from consultants EDAW gave more details of the LMF’s proposals, which focuses development in six neighbourhoods. Tom also gave details of the community focused, commercially driven Special Purpose Vehicle which will be established in April to deliver the Legacy plan. 

Baroness Jo Valentine, Chief Executive of London First spoke about keeping London competitive during difficult economic times. She explained that whilst London due to its global outlook and focus on financial services had been hard hit by the downturn, as a city it had traditionally always come out of recession early. She also talked of the need to use the current time to plan for the upturn and to make the most of opportunities presented by tourism caused by the “competitive” pound. 

The final speech was given by Sir Bob Kerslake, Chief Executive of the Homes and Communities Agency who talked about the importance of creating communities rather than simply delivering housing. Sir Bob updated the conference on the “Single Conversation” and talked about of “Local Investment Agreements” which are being piloted in several areas including as part of the 5 host Olympic boroughs Multi Area Agreement (MAA).

A question and answer session preceded lunch where delegates networked and viewed the exhibition material provided by SRP board members and other partners including the ODA and Crossrail.

The afternoon included workshops on the 14-19 diplomas, engaging families in the development process, the Stratford public realm strategy and the development of the "Stratford Story", a branding strategy for Stratford. There was also the demonstration of the new 3d computer model of Stratford which will be launched later this year. Some delegates were also able to take part in a visit to the site of the Athletes Village.

SRP’s Chief Executive Alison Young said “We are absolutely delighted with the attendance at the conference and with the amount of interest shown in the area by such a huge cross section of organizations. The conference has shown that despite the current economic climate, major change is still taking place in Stratford, providing jobs and other opportunities for the local community."

John Burton from Westfield said “The event was a great opportunity to get some good news, at a time when everyone seems to pedal bad news”

Rob Johnson from Lend Lease said “Creating a community is all about hardware and software. The Olympics is bringing the hardware and we all have a lot to do in creating the software, making Stratford a great place to live”

Sir Robin Wales said "Stratford is right in the heart of East London with massive growth potential, major investment in public transport, the Olympic Park, state of the art retail, a university campus and much more Stratford is an exciting place to be. I'm working hard to harness these benefits for the local community. The council's unique public-private partnership job brokerage service has placed more that 1,700 local people into employment since May 2007 and I'm proud to announce a new Stratford City Retail Academy that will train local people in retail, leisure and hospitality ensuring that local people are in a position to benefit from the 10,000 new jobs planned at Stratford City.”

The event was also filmed by the "Newham News Crew", a project run as part of the Creative and Media diploma by the City Learning Centre and Circus Media. The project teaches young people the skills to create and shoot news bulletins and research and carry out interviews. Students from years 9 and 10 attended the entire event, filming and interviewing delegates and speakers. Footage provided by the Newham News Crew will be available on this web site in due course.

View the Annual Conference Photographs

PowerPoint Presentation Documents of the SRP second annual conference

The following Power Point files are available for you to freely download. Please note that some of the files are large and therefore not suitable for download via a dial up connection.

To view the files you will need either PowerPoint or the PowerPoint viewer installed on your computer. The PowerPoint viewer is free and available as a download via Microsoft:

Download page for: PowerPoint viewer

PowerPoint Presentation Documents

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