Shared digital infrastructure for places
YourTown exists to help towns and places stop rebuilding the same digital tools in isolation, and start improving shared infrastructure together.
Across the UK, councils, BIDs, charities and local partners are all trying to solve similar challenges online: directories, events, volunteering, local information, participation, accessibility. Too often, each place funds its own solution, learning is lost between projects, and long-term improvement stalls.
YourTown is a different approach.
Why YourTown exists
Most local digital platforms don’t fail because of poor intent or lack of effort. They struggle because they are built as one-off projects, owned by no one in the long term, and disconnected from wider learning.
That leads to a familiar pattern:
- The same features are rebuilt repeatedly in different places
- Budgets are spread thin across isolated projects
- Platforms launch well, then age quickly
- Innovation resets every time funding or leadership changes
YourTown exists to break that pattern by creating shared digital infrastructure that improves over time, across places, rather than starting from scratch each time.
What we mean by “community tech”
Community tech is not vendor software rebranded.
It is a model where:
- The infrastructure is shared across towns
- Investment improves the platform for everyone, not just one place
- Purpose is shaped locally, not dictated centrally
- Long-term stewardship matters more than short-term delivery
Instead of each place buying and owning a separate product, towns collaborate on a shared platform that evolves through collective learning and investment.
How YourTown works at a high level
YourTown provides a shared infrastructure layer that towns can use and adapt to their local context.
- Each place controls its own content, activity and priorities
- Improvements funded in one place roll out to others
- Decisions are shaped collaboratively, not unilaterally
- The platform improves continuously, rather than being replaced every few years
This allows places to focus on serving their communities, rather than repeatedly solving the same technical problems.
Who YourTown is for
YourTown is designed for organisations that care about places and long-term outcomes, including:
- Local authorities
- BIDs and town centre partnerships
- Charities and community organisations
- Place-based collaborations and alliances
It is particularly suited to places that want to make limited budgets go further, reduce duplication, and build something that lasts.
Open by design, shaped together
YourTown is developed openly and collaboratively.
Rather than hiding decisions behind procurement processes or vendor roadmaps, priorities are discussed, tested and refined through a shared collaboration space. This allows early towns and partners to shape how the platform evolves, and to learn from each other along the way.
The website explains the model.
The collaboration space is where the work happens.
A long-term public asset mindset
YourTown is not built to extract profit or lock places into proprietary systems.
It is held in trust for participating towns and partners, with a focus on stewardship, sustainability and shared benefit.
Think of it like roads, libraries or transport networks, but for local digital infrastructure.