Tom Swithinbank Project Manager for Bristol BID’s – making Bristol city centre a more sustainable and enjoyable place to visit.
In this episode, I’m going behind the scenes of Bristol City Centre and talking to Tom Swithinbank, whose work involves working with over 1200 organisations to make the city’s businesses more sustainable.
Tom also manages projects that make Bristol City Centre a more appealing place to visit.
Tom works for Visit West, specifically for the three Business Improvement Districts (BID’s) Broadmead BID, Bristol City Centre BID & Redcliffe & Temple BID.
If you’re a regular listener to the podcast, you will know that l love chatting with people who work in and around BID’s as their work can make a big difference in towns, cities or destinations – and all of the businesses within them.
For those who don’t know what a BID does, the good ones provide services from event creation and marketing, to street cleaning and policing.
We chat about:
> How Tom’s work contributes to Bristol City Council’s ambitious target to be carbon neutral by 2030.
> A free bike check service called Dr Bike.
> An initiative for city centre workers to bring their own lunch boxes to Finzels Reach food market to cut down on take away packaging.
> The use of cargo bikes for businesses who need local deliveries.
> The future of the historic Castle Park and the exciting plans for redeveloping the area.