Investing in town centre buildings and increasing the breadth of the town’s offer for the benefit of residents and visitors
Campbeltown Town Centre Regeneration Project
Campbeltown, Scotland
£3.4m (+ £9.5m match)
Argyll & Bute Council and a range of private, community and third sector partners
European Commission, Heritage Lottery Fund, Highlands & Islands Enterprise, Historic Environment Scotland, Scottish Government
2007-2024
Town (pop. 4,852)
Community / Economy
Less affluent
Development of commercial, retail, leisure, residential, civic and/or historic buildings
Campbeltown is a small rural town, located on the west coast of Scotland. By the 1990s, changes to the tourism industry and the closures of the RAF base, shipyard and clothing factory had all led to a shortage of high value jobs and unemployment. Along with depopulation and a lack of inward investment, the local economy was increasingly fragile. Consequently, the town had fallen into disrepair, with a growing number of deteriorating and derelict buildings. These reinforced the community’s feeling that their town was tired, in need of investment and had been forgotten.
In 2005, a public-sector consortium, led by Argyll and Bute Council, came together to consult the community and develop a regeneration strategy for Campbeltown and the surrounding peninsular. This helped to kickstart a series of investments in the town, such as the redevelopment of the leisure centre, health centre and police station and create a new dental surgery and an affordable housing development.
With maritime transport key to the local area, the quay was extended to better serve a range of industries, and an enhanced berthing facility was opened to provide facilities for 54 yachts and cruisers to encourage people to disembark, restock and spend time in Campbeltown. These improvements boosted the town’s morale and built momentum for other initiatives relying on community involvement and investment.
Since 2007, Argyll and Bute Council has obtained a series of grants which have enabled it to seed-fund improvements to rejuvenate the building stock in Campbeltown town centre. Funding totalling £3.4m was leveraged mainly from the Conservation Area Regeneration Scheme (CARS), Townscape Heritage Initiative (THI), Town Centre Fund and the Council’s CHORD project (to aid regeneration and economic development in its five major waterside towns). This core funding was complemented by £9.5m match funding from the private, public and third sectors, enabling a £13m programme of investments in town centre premises.
Over 230 grants were awarded via a ‘small grants scheme’ for owners repairing residential and commercial properties, and a ‘shopfront improvement scheme’ helping businesses upgrade their frontages. Grants were typically in the range of £1k-£5k, although some were notably more (£25k+). Jointly, these grants benefitted about 30 commercial and 60 residential premises and were used for more than 75 shopfront improvements.
A key outcome is the investment in 11 prominent tenement buildings (i.e., ground floor commercial space with flats above) that were repaired using CARS and THI grant funding, with match funding from private sector housing grants and the private owners’ contributions. Thirty new owners’ associations were set up to enable these renovations and to facilitate ongoing maintenance works to keep the buildings in good repair.
Some building improvements were relatively small-scale, such as painting and repairing traditional timber frontages, while others were more extensive. Derelict buildings were assessed with detailed feasibility studies to identify how they might be repurposed to best serve the needs of the town. In particular, a number of significant but derelict listed buildings in the town centre and harbour were brought back into community use:
The former town hall was converted into a community hub, with office space for rent, conference and meeting facilities. The main hall is now hired out for events such as concerts and weddings (by South Kintyre Development Trust).
The old schoolhouse was converted into a backpackers’ hostel (providing an income for Kintyre Amenity Trust).
The Picture House cinema was reopened after a 12-year, £3m renovation (by Campbeltown Community Business).
New owners invested £3m in the Royal Hotel, reopening it as a four-star, 23 room hotel with pub and restaurant.
A series of 21 community training events were held in parallel to the building renovations. These taught nearly 300 participants from local trades, contractors and housing agencies the skills to repair and maintain traditional building features such as stonework, leadwork and sash windows. More than 2,000 participants took part in another 22 community events, which included training on fundraising, marketing, archaeology and genealogy, to help community groups deliver local projects.
A part-time handyman is employed during the summer months to keep the town centre looking its best during the visitor season. They litter-pick, remove flyposting, weed green space and water hanging baskets, clean the windows and paint the railings of public buildings.
Small-scale public realm improvements, such as fingerpost signs and dropped kerbs, have improved navigation and accessibility. A cross-town active travel route is in development, which will support the town’s 20-minute neighbourhood, from the hospital and secondary school in the south through the town centre to the supermarket and primary school in the north. The ‘Discover Campbeltown’ app (approximately 500 downloads per year) features walking and cycling routes around the town, including a whisky-themed trail and scavenger hunt. Free guided walks (self-led or with volunteers) showcase the town’s architecture and heritage.
Thanks to these works, the fabric of much of the town centre’s building stock has been safeguarded for the long term. Campbeltown is now a more desirable place to live and work, with a more vibrant retail and leisure offer, enhanced visual appeal and a café culture.
The number of vacant units decreased from 20 in 2010 to 3 in 2021. The small grant scheme alone enabled 15 units and over 3,700 m2 of vacant floorspace to be brought back into use. Due to their success in Campbeltown (and Rothesay), Argyll and Bute Council began similar grant schemes in other towns.
Twenty new businesses opened in the town between 2018 and 2022, 13 of which are still trading in 2024. Informal feedback from one local business, which relocated to newly renovated premises in 2019, is that it has expanded from two employees to a team of nine, and annual turnover has more than doubled. Two other local businesses report increases in turnover of 10%-15% in the last two years.
In 2020, consultants Stantec carried out an evaluation of the economic impact of building improvement works in Campbeltown to date. They estimated that:
The re-opened floorspace would have created 51 new jobs, generating the equivalent of £2.4m of gross GVA per annum.
The equivalent of 114 temporary construction jobs were created, generating over £4m in gross construction GVA.
In the results of a survey of more than 400 local people:
90% said regeneration works had led to Campbeltown being an improved place, with 62% more likely to visit the town centre and 64% likely to spend more money there.
90% of businesses said the regeneration works had been transformative to their business.
70% of beneficiaries said they wouldn’t have been able to fund works without the grant they received. On average, they spent nearly 85% of their renovation budget with other businesses in Campbeltown.
88% of participating contractors said grant funded renovations had generated follow-on work, based on their improved profile and experience.
According to Stantec’s research, another key outcome of the scheme has been the empowerment of the Campbeltown community. It has reinforced a sense of local pride and community spirit and given local people the confidence and ability to achieve their own change. For example, South Kintyre Development Trust is now running a community gardening project, which brings older and young people together to care for the town’s public green space.
While the area still suffers from a lack of high-quality jobs and a shortage of construction contractors, the local housing market remains buoyant and, in 2020, SURF named Campbeltown ‘Scotland’s Most Improved Place’ (in its awards for best practice in community regeneration). The town’s regeneration continues, with the three whisky distilleries beginning to invest in themselves as visitor destinations, and plans for more distilleries and a golf course and leisure complex in the pipeline. It is once again seen as a place worth investing in.
Ensuring that all building improvements were done to conservation area standards has preserved the town’s heritage and unique character.
To avoid uniformity, no design standards were set for shopfronts, but the use of pastel colours was encouraged to create visual harmony.
The project’s public, private and third sector partners were adaptable in leveraging funding from new sources. Initial quick wins helped to build trust and get the local community on board with a shared vision of what needed to be done.
The same Project Officer provided continuity throughout the project. For more than ten years, the council team worked from a town centre office building shared with local community groups. This provided an informal ‘regeneration HQ’ where information was shared and networks were built.
www.argyll-bute.gov.uk/planning-and-building/growth-and-development/campbeltown-regeneration