How Trefi Smart Towns Cymru is future-proofing high streets
Image credit: Sian, Expose Photography.
Kiki Rees-Stavros, project manager at Trefi Smart Towns Cymru, explores how the programme is helping to elevate the country’s high streets.
Data-driven decision making
Our mission at Smart Towns Cymru is regenerating Welsh high streets, in line with the Transforming Towns agenda. It might sound strange then to start by saying that we do not have the solution that will save our town centres.
We know that weighing the pig does not make it any fatter, but we also know that making decisions based on a hunch, anecdotal evidence or ‘the way we’ve always done things’ is not working. This is why we are supporting councils, communities and businesses to harness data for a better understanding of our high streets.
We believe that for our towns and businesses to prosper, they need to be able to make informed decisions, and to respond in real time to the challenges and opportunities on their high streets. This means monitoring footfall, which in recent years has become the standard for classifying town centres.
While there is no standard for monitoring footfall in Welsh towns, and no perfect way of recording exact figures, having a yardstick to compare year on year, or before and after interventions, allows decision
makers to gain a better understanding of the factors that impact their town, how they can capitalise on opportunities and mitigate challenges.
We saw this kind of monitoring enter the spotlight following the pandemic, but even then, data was mainly available to high street managers and fed into media reports.
Thanks to investment from the Welsh Government, we are striving to make this kind of data available to all. We are also empowering businesses with the skills to use this kind of data, so that they can be agile and adaptable enough to compete with the data-driven multinationals, and e-commerce giants.
Open data: levelling the playing field
Since the advent of Tesco’s Clubcard nearly
30 years ago, supermarket chains have developed advanced strategies to understand their customers’ habits and preferences. They collect and manipulate data to build customer profiles allowing them to predict what we want and when, maybe even before we know it.
Tracking shoppers’ movement on aisles informs product placement in a similar way to ecommerce analysis, providing these businesses with actionable insights.
High street chains have the resources to buy private licenses for high street data and employ analysts and strategists to help them respond competitively. Meanwhile, independent businesses often struggle to keep up, lacking the resources and expertise. Enter Patrwm...
Patrwm is an open access Smart Places platform built for Wales by Kodergarten, in collaboration with social enterprise Menter Môn. Patrwm visualises data collected from town WiFi analytics, from footfall and dwell time (measured by probe requests) to demographic data given with consent when people log in to the WiFi. No personal data is collected - and the data is freely available for anyone to access and use.
This allows businesses to identify trends, or ‘patterns’ in their town over time, and even to compare their high street with other similar towns. This system is currently in place in three Welsh counties, allowing businesses to adapt opening hours, stocking and staffing levels, target their marketing campaigns, and compare data sets to understand the effect of weather, holidays, events and countless other factors on their town and business performance.
We are often asked about privacy and the ethics of measuring footfall. It is important that these questions are asked, and we advocate for transparency with any kind of data collecting. It is equally important to understand that compared to the kind of surveillance that we consent to when we enter a supermarket or airport or scroll blindly to click ‘accept’ on websites and apps, Smart Towns technology is relatively primitive and unobtrusive. We are simply trying to make sure that our towns do not get left behind in this data revolution.
Public engagement
While the aim of the Smart Towns project is to improve economic activity on our high streets, the wider benefit of these projects in Wales is to improve the town centre experience for both residents and visitors.
This all begins with public engagement. This is not a programme that enforces technology on a town as part of a strategic rollout. Our process begins with a workshop where we introduce the idea of Smart Towns, and the many potential benefits to the community. We’re always fascinated to see how the diverse character of our communities can bring about endless possibilities, depending on the challenges they face and their priorities as a community.
We have mining towns harnessing technology to preserve their history and highlight their culture and market towns monitoring air quality to push for behaviour (and even policy) change. Town councils using WiFi systems to send targeted emails, helping keep residents informed and visitors engaged. Smarter parking and traffic management to boost accessibility as well as business. Monitoring sound levels at night can help to reduce anti-social behaviour, and remote monitoring of defibrillators and flotation devices can mean the difference between life and death.
Reducing routine monitoring in industries from hospitality and health to farming can save valuable time as well as running costs for our businesses. Smart buildings systems to reduce energy use can literally mean being able to keep the lights on for some businesses.
The Welsh government’s investment into LoRaWAN coverage across the country is enabling our towns and businesses to deploy low-cost sensors onto open licence networks to improve efficiency and sustainability across the board.
Future proofing our councils
And it isn’t just businesses who are trying to keep their heads above the water. With Local Authorities’ budgets becoming ever tighter, Smart Towns technologies can help councils cut costs without cutting services.
We have seen councils implement sensors in their buildings, bins and public toilets to monitor use and adapt services accordingly. This means freeing up their teams for more pressing tasks and reducing emissions by eliminating unnecessary checks. Parallel to this, data on usage is helping to justify investment in our public services and ensure that valuable resources are allocated according to demand.
Scaling these kinds of efficiencies over a county or even a country can mean significant savings and can help local authorities hit their net zero targets.
Creating a Smart Towns ecosystem
A thriving high street is supported by a connected and collaborative ecosystem and the success of Smart Towns projects is determined not by the technology or innovation used, but by the ‘Smart Ambassadors’ driving the project.
Smart Towns Cymru is building networks between businesses, councils, and communities, fostering a spirit of cooperation and mutual support. By sharing data and insights, these stakeholders can work together to implement strategies that benefit the entire town.
This ecosystem approach encourages innovation and resilience. For example, if a particular intervention proves successful in one town, the data can be shared with others, enabling them to replicate and adapt successful strategies. We are championing this through case studies, study visits and in conferences and roadshows across the country.
We are also encouraging knowledge sharing on a more strategic level with our online networking sessions providing an informal opportunity for decision makers to share experiences – and most importantly – what doesn’t work. Honest discussion in this field has allowed councils to save thousands of pounds of public money and streamline innovation.
Through this collaborative and community-based approach to Smart Towns projects, we are cultivating a culture shift that will outlast the lifespan of individual projects, instilling an appetite and aptitude for data in everyone from shopkeepers to decision makers all over Wales.
