ENTERPRISE ZONES

• The strongly nucleated nature of Ryde’s economic activity, embedded in pockets amongst densely residential and high-profile visitor areas, lends itself to a social enterprise approach to neighbourhood regeneration and the development of opportunity and livelihood. A network of Social Enterprise Zones can be envisaged, overlapping with the public realm project zones and connected across the town as it is now and as it may become.

• A Social Enterprise Zone combines an active collaboration and partnership of public, private and voluntary sectors in establishing, supporting and developing business, industry, employment and training. Its objective is to build sustainable economic development, based particularly on the foundation resources of place in its natural and cultural capital, that has a strongly positive effect on the social conditions and wellbeing of its neighbourhood.

• A Ryde Social Enterprise Zone will look at commercial acquisition and management of affordable workspace by local authorities, productive meanwhile use of redundant property, combinations of funding support including regional LEP, Coastal Communities and related government initiatives, the Public Works Loan Board, local levy ‘bundles’ including s106 infrastructure support, car park revenue and business rate interventions, and the creation of hyperlocal Business Improvement Districts (BIDs).