PENICUIK is showing the way for the development of community shops that might just help to improve the run-down high streets of Scotland.
The National can reveal that Penicuik Storehouse is set to open in the town before Easter, marking the first integrated community bakery, indoor market and café, in the country.
The Midlothian town has suffered various economic setbacks but the local community is determined to see the Storehouse play a vital part in revival of the town centre, with more that 700 people contributing a total of more than £100,000 in shares for the venture. The Storehouse will have a Breadshare Community Bakery, the Lost Garden Foodhall, a café and an indoor market with a community area.
Roger Kelly, a former convener of the Royal Town Planning Institute of Scotland is the convener of the Penicuik Community Alliance which is driving forward the Storehouse project at 22 High Street in the town.
He told The National: “In recent years local institutions have disappeared one by one, such as local savings bank, and local electricity suppliers.
“They have all been swallowed up by much bigger conglomerates and in many cases operated from a long way away, and that has happened in Penicuik as elsewhere.
“The big stores, for example, do a good job for their customers, but they are not local specific in the sense of being run by or providing a social umbrella for their communities.”
Penicuik’s Community Development Trust was the mainspring for the Alliance and the Storehouse project He explained: “The Trust has developed and encouraged such projects as the Lost Garden, with garden restoration and fruit growing, the printworks and museum and the weekly cinema and open house in the Town Hall.
“We have a street market, a local business improvement district and many more improvements.
“The Penicuik Community Alliance is separate from the Trust and there are new people who have come in and got involved in the Storehouse project.”
Using the Breadshare brand, the community bakery will be run in the Storehouse using local people, while other parts of the project will be developed in the community such as the stalls for the indoor market.
“We have even sourced varieties of Scottish wheat from a specialist farm in East Lothian so we can offer different types of Scottish bread.”
The opening date has still to be set but Roger Kelly and his colleagues are confident that they can open in March and no later than April.
Builder Colum Beagan and his team have completed a lot of the work needed to transform the former Co-operative premises.
The Alliance has already received support from the Scottish Government, Midlothian Council, Midlothian Voluntary Alliance, Social Investment Scotland and from Community Shares Scotland Kelly said: “We’re optimistic about the future of Penicuik, and we believe the Storehouse can become an important hub for the local economy, bringing high quality jobs to the town for the long term and supporting the best local food producers.”
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