A SOMERSET councillor has criticised “iPad users” for being negative about efforts to regenerate Yeovil town centre, writes Daniel Mumby.

Through the Yeovil Refresh programme, South Somerset District Council is delivering improvements to the public realm and local transport and trying to encourage new development.

The scheme been beset by issues, with the council’s district executive voting last Thursday (January 5) to allocate further funding to deal with a £4.2million budget gap across the various projects.

But Cllr Peter Gubbins, portfolio holder for Yeovil Refresh, maintains it will be a success once completed, complaining “iPad” critics are “few and far between”.

The Yeovil Refresh includes improvements to five key parts of the town centre - Westminster Street; The Triangle and Wine Street; Middle Street; High Street and The Borough; and Wyndham Street.

The total budget for the works was originally set at £11.2million, on top of around £1.6m for “transport system changes” and more than £9.3m for “major projects”, bringing the total budget to £22.129m.

According to council predictions, the public realm elements are currently running more than £4.2m over-budget – with the works on The Triangle and Wine Street contributing half of the overspend.

As a results, the district executive committee has voted to provide nearly £2m extra for the programme, bringing the new total budget to £24.122m.

This will come from re-allocating around £1.2m of council funds from the transport element of the programme after external grant funding was obtained, as well as using £821,000 from an agreed reserve.

Further savings will come from redesigning the revamp of High Street and the eastern part of Middle Street, replacing the planned ‘tree pits’ with raised planting areas saving around £435,000, as well as re-allocating £146,000 towards delivering the new outdoor screen which will be erected at The Triangle.

Cllr Gubbins told the committee: “We’ve had to face many, many problems, from utilities companies not knowing where their pipes are going through to buildings collapsing.

“There’s been a hell of a lot of work on this. I’ve been in business for 30 years – when you get a change, and another change, and then another change on top, it’s not easy.”

He added: "This is not a failure – this will be a success. We are trying to promote our town.”

Cllr Tony Lock, portfolio holder for protecting core services, added: “The scheme has not progressed how we would have liked. You have to look at the situation.

“We’ve had Covid, which has taken two years out of the working of this. We have had one of the companies which was charged with doing one section of this going into liquidation – that’s not the council’s fault.

“We now have high interest rates which is pushing costs up.

"I think we’ve done a fantastic job under the circumstances.”