Town Council
Glovertown Centre Plan
The Glovertown Centre Plan developed by CBCL Limited was presented to the community on October 22nd, 2014 to an audience of thirty stakeholders and residents of Glovertown.
To download a PDF copy of the Glovertown Centre Plan via Dropbox, click here.
The vision for the Glovertown Centre Plan is:
“To grow the Town Centre into a complete and attractive neighborhood that offers shops and services, jobs and homes, schools and museums, natural open space and recreational facilities, and more… all within a twenty minute walk of one another.”
The project has been successful in developing concepts and themes for the development of a stretch of Station Road-Main Street South that starts at the Town Hall and continues to the Glovertown Marina Facility. The plan seeks to integrate assets located off of Main Street, including businesses, recreation facilities, and cultural installations. Improvements to the user experience is a cornerstone of the plan, seeking vehicle circulation improvements, creating new green spaces, and improving the pedestrian realm.
Benefits of a Town Centre Development
A vibrant Town Centre is important to the quality of life and economy of the community. The Town centre is a reflection of how the community sees itself, which is crucial to the retention and attraction of businesses.
Developing a Town Centre affects how businesses and people evaluate where they operate and live. Businesses invest where there is a high quality of life. People who seek a place to live look for communities that offer a range of products and services, as well as civic and cultural amenities.
The benefits of developing a Town Centre area are as follows:
- Generating reinvestment.
- Supporting business growth and job creation.
- Supporting economic growth throughout the community.
- Providing local focus and stability.
- Improving community quality of life.
Economic Development, Marketing, and Supporting Business
A Town Centre Development can be supported by the market that the community of Glovertown serves. Throughout its history, going back to the days of the railway, Glovertown has been a hub of activity for residents of the Terra Nova region. In the last few years, with improvements made to the Central Health Clinic, and changes in the commercial operations in other locales in the region, Glovertown has taken on a larger role in the delivery of services and products to consumers from Hare Bay to Charlottetown, and all places in between. The figure, developed by economists at Miller Dickinson Blais, shows the annual retail spending levels of a region that is home to roughly 8500 people.
In addition to the regional residents that support Glovertown’s economy, visitors to Glovertown and area provide a major boost to the businesses that operate in our community. This includes people visiting the Glovertown for recreation reasons, whether at the Arena, Ballfield, or on the ATV trails; and the many individuals in Newfoundland who view the Terra Nova Region as the place to go for a vacation that is not too far away. Nostalgia for the Glovertown area, the Eastport Peninsula, and Terra Nova National park, brings tourists back to this area frequently. Glovertown can take advantage of these visitors by offering products and services that might not be easily found in these neighboring areas. Furthermore, the high rate of visitors at Terra Nova National Park represent a market for Glovertown’s commercial entities to tap into.
Implementing the Town Centre Plan recommendations can attract consumers in these markets to stay longer, spend more, and spread by word of mouth the positive experiences that they’ve had in Glovertown while shopping in local businesses, visiting cultural installations, or using the many existing and proposed recreation facilities and green spaces.
Marketing the Town Centre:
- Work with the business community to further define the type of experience it would like to provide to residents, businesses, and visitors.
- Build on and extend the success of events like Alexander Bay Days and the Winter Carnival.
- Adopt a “go to them” approach to promote and sell local goods and services to Terra Nova Park users.
- Develop one new Glovertown-based tour making use of community stories, arts and cultural assets.
- Emphasize the importance of core customer service skills to all local businesses.
- Work with the Marina operators to disseminate information regarding Glovertown services to boaters.
- Work with local businesses to develop seasonal promotions and events.
- Continue marketing the Town as a place for sporting events.
Supporting Business:
- Improve coordination and cross promotion of the town’s existing business services.
- Investigate small seed funding program from the Town to support new arts based initiatives.
- Examine zoning by-laws enabling ‘live-work-sell’ space in the Town Centre to increase activity and make use of empty or dilapidated buildings.
- Increase the visibility of the local business directory on the Town’s website
- Prioritize the regular updating of the business directory and ensure all appropriate business websites are listed.
- Establish partnerships with regional agencies and NGO’s to support and enhance program delivery.
Plan Components
The six Glovertown Centre Plan Components are as follows:
Town Centre Aesthetics: Integrates the existing Town logo into a recognizable Town Centre aesthetic.
Wayfinding Strategy: Improves exposure to, makes it easier to travel within the Town Centre through attractive and strategically-placed wayfinding signs.
Spatial Planning: Provides improvements to vehicular, pedestrian and off-road vehicular connectivity, and provides some public space concepts.
Streetscape Design: Illustrates how comfortable street furniture and attractive landscaping, among others, can improve the form and function of the Town Centre.
Architectural Guidelines: Illustrates how modest facade improvements to commercial and residential buildings can improve the look and feel of the Town Centre
Economic Development: Provides ideas to promote and market the Town Centre area to entice visitors and business investment.
Opportunity Areas
Implementation and Budget
The recommendations of the Glovertown Centre Plan are phased into short, medium, and long-term projects. The below diagram outlines the recommended phasing for the specific elements of the plan.
The overall budget for implementing the Glovertown Centre Plan as proposed is $2,865,000. This does not include the cost of property acquisitions that may be necessary to go forward with implementation. This figure is representative of an estimate of the total costs, and does not reflect the Town’s contribution. It is the intent of Town Council to seek funding from a variety of sources to offset the cost of various elements included in the plan.
Glovertown Centre Plan Contributors
The Town of Glovertown would like to thank its funding partners. Without the support of the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency (ACOA), and The Department of Business, Tourism, Culture, and Rural Development (BTCRD), this project would not have reached such a successful conclusion. These agencies, through the Innovative Communities Fund, and the Regional Development Fund, respectively, each contributed 40% of the project costs.
The Town of Glovertown also would like to thank contributors from the business community. Their generosity and support showed our funders at ACOA and BTCRD that there is most definitely an appetite for developing a vibrant area for commerce, culture, and recreation.
The Town of Glovertown would like to recognize the support of the following businesses and organizations:
- AIM Services Alexander Bay
- Automotive/Glovertown Esso/Greco Pizza
- Alexander Bay Lion’s Club
- Alexander Bay-Terra Nova Development Association
- Bank of Nova Scotia
- East-Glo Castle Building Centre
- Fab-Tech Industries
- Feltham’s Construction and Aggregates
- Glovertown Foodland
- Glovertown Irving
- Glovertown Pharmachoice
- Lilac Inn
- Nancy’s Flower Patch
- Terra Nova Goodwill Centre
- Venture Credit Union
- Woodman’s Garage & Salvage