As businesses in Falmouth face tough times while essential power works are carried out in the first three months of next year, the Packet is today launching the I'm Supporting Falmouth campaign.

Partnering up with the Falmouth Town Council, Falmouth BID, Western Power Distribution (WPD) and Kier, we will be running regular updates and promotional stories to encourage people to continue to come to Falmouth and support the many local businesses throughout the town centre.

Several initiatives, including free car parking on Saturdays and additional free shuttle buses, will be rolled out in the new year when work starts on the project, which will be completed over the next five years.

The work being carried out by WPD involves replacing underground power cables which were laid in 1945 and replacing a sub-station currently underground outside Marks and Spencer with a new one in Church Street car park.

It will mean vehicular access to the town centre will be severely restricted between January 8, when work starts, and March 16, when it will be wrapped up until next year.

The power company has been working closely with the Town Team and liaising with traders in an effort to minimise the impact of the works as much as possible. It has been agreed to carry it out over the first three months of the next five years, rather than in one go, as January to March is traditionally the quietest time of the year.

Since that decision was made, WPD has sent out 1,500 letters to businesses and people living in the town centre, explaining the project with another 1,500 due to go out in the next ten days. Three drop-in sessions were also held where people could find out more and raise concerns, WPD personnel have also attended three traders' meetings and a meeting of the town council and carried out door-to-door meetings.

John Nesbitt, distribution manager for WPD, told traders last week: "It's going to be a very difficult period, I understand that, but hopefully we can get through this. Our aim is to get the town back to normal as soon as possible."

Speaking of the I'm Supporting Falmouth campaign, Falmouth BID manager, Richard Wilcox, said: “Falmouth has a fantastic business scene aligned with a proactive resident community and we will do all we can to provide a wide variety of support during this time.

"A huge amount of activity has now been secured; a result of extensive lobbying and discussions with several organisations who will work alongside us to deliver initiatives that can help our special town during the works. This really does demonstrate the strength of Falmouth’s ‘can-do’ attitude with residents, businesses and organisations working together at this key time.”

Town manager, Richard Gates, added: “On behalf of the Town Team it is a great step forward to be able to confirm the host of measures that have been put in place to assist the town during these works. I would like to thank Falmouth Town Council, Falmouth BID and Western Power in what is another good example of proactive town partnerships.

"While the works are essential, it is clearly going to be a challenging time so the message is very much for the wider community to please make use of the free shuttle buses that will run Monday to Saturday, the free Saturday car parking in Cornwall Council car parks and support your town.”

Among the initiatives already agreed are:

* Free car parking which will be available every Saturday from January 6 until March 17. This will be in every Cornwall Council-owned car park in the town – the Quarry, The Moor, New Street, Grove Place, The Dell, Gyllyngvase, but of course excludes Church Street car park which will be closed for the duration of the works.

* Two free community shuttle buses have been secured to support local residents and encourage them into town. These will run on a 15-minute loop and run as close as is possible to the current community bus route - from the Quarry, through The Moor, Market Strand, Prince of Wales Pier, out and along Albany Road, Woodlane, Dell car park, Grove Place and New St/Church Corner - as close as is possible for shoppers to access Church Street area of town.

* An extensive promotional campaign supporting Falmouth and its businesses has been secured with Pirate FM for the duration of the works. Over 250, 30-second Falmouth features will run four times daily.

* A social media campaign will provide further support and run extensively across all town platforms.

* Information and details will be circulated to residents in the new year with key information outlining the details of the electrical works, listing the variety of supportive measures and pushing the support the community and shop local messages.

While everything is being done to manage the situation as efficiently as possible, due to the complex nature of the electrical works being undertaken, some flexibility is being factored in so the Town Team can respond and support the business and wider community as much as possible.

A page has been set up on the town's official website where all the latest information on the work will be posted. This can be found at falmouth.co.uk/westernpower/.