Some thoughts about dying town centres

[OtterTails]

I have been reading an older thread from 2022 about how many towns across the UK are becoming hollow shells of their former selves. How anti social issues have increased in many of these dying towns, with empty shops and even entire disused precincts.
My own old home town suffered a similar fate - where once there was a mix of social backgrounds and culture, old and young, this has steadily been replaced by troubled souls (addicts/ street drinkers, etc). You never see elderly people there now, and the regular shoppers disappeared after the closure of M&S about 5 years ago. One reason that likely makes this worse is that the local council placed a lot of the troubled singles in the areas around the town centre, which I think has put the last nail in the coffin.

But even though most of us are aware of big stores such as Amazon and online shopping having played a huge pat in this decline, I think there's more to it. Probably a mix of many reasons. We shop differently now, and the wold is changing, etc etc...

And then I thought (not heard this mentioned before), since so many people in the thread said that difficult road systems and parking fees have put them off going into town, maybe our increasing car use has played a big role, too.
There are far many more people on the roads now than ever before, and many older town centres don't have the space or infrastructure to manage this. So in this sense I think that the way we use our cars has altered how we choose to shop, which is quite different to say 20 years ago at the latter end of the high street boom, when many people still used public transport to go to town, even if they owned a vehicle. Or there were simply less people driving, so the roads/carparks weren't as chock full.

Just a thought, it might not just be about business rates or online shopping.

In my old town now, most of the people on the dying high street are at the lowest income bracket, which was absolutely not the case even 10 years ago. I am wondering if this is because they are less likely to own a vehicle - and the only shops that remain cater to this market.
So our larger economy is shaping the decline also.

Most of the pretty, thriving towns I know aren't particularly affluent, but they do have a mix of culture and age ranges, and people coming through often. My old home town doesn't, so the casino's and cheap shops are the only one's left.

I go to bath when I want to shop in person, we live in a small town outside. The tourism obviously helps and the town centre is thriving. The town I live in is shocking, there are a few supermarkets within walking distance of the centre (if you can call it that) but what's supposed to be the high street is dead. A couple of charity shops, a costa, and 2 discount shops.

I think even tourist areas have a story to tell behind the scenes. There's a slow rot in some beautiful places, perhaps masked by the stunning scenery and gift shops.
Then again, I have never really taken gift shops as a sign of prosperity. I don't even see, since so many of them are single staffed and tiny, how they benefit a residential community at all.

One of the towns I grew up in near was overtaken by Tourist and antique shops - no actual normal shopping at all really. Think it does well but normal shopping used to go to another town center not far away which is also in decline.

I think Tourist areas that do well manage to hang on to normal shops so have a tourist draw or two odd gift style shop and a normal shopping center.

Town that does well nearby also has large supermarkets right by the shopping center I think the council planned it all very well. Something this city hasn't done - it's spread them out all over with other dots of out of town retail parks and then one big site with all supermarkets with cinema and two eating places one now gone only accessible really with car and no where near center.

The problem with tourist towns is it’s fine if you want to buy an ornament or fragranced candle but less so if you need some clothes pegs and a washing up bowl.

@OutOfTheHouse I agree- which was why I like it here in Bath - tourist stuff plus all the practical ordinary stuff too - I would say same in York, Norwich etc - balance is important I think and not always there these days

@willsandnoodle yep- I think it's one of the reason it thrives here- the shopping is still very centralised and varied and although we have the 'naice stuff' we have Poundland (great for Longley farm cottage cheese by the way) and Greggs and Superdrug plus Maccy Ds and KFC etc- lucky to live here even though it costs us an arm and a leg . As you say some of the places on the edge are not that great

Trouble is without tourists, you'd get neither! A clothes peg shop isn't going to suddenly open up is it? In most places there's no shortage of empty shops, so your hypothetic clothes peg shop could almost certainly find a suitable empty shop to rent in most places other than the hyper-busy tourist honey spots. There are even empty shops in Bowness and Ambleside in the Lake District and in York city centre! In fact, without tourists buying ornaments, there'd be even fewer people in city centres and presumably the candle buying tourist may also buy something for lunch in a sandwich shop or pub or cafe, so without them, you may not even have pubs and cafes staying open which also serve locals.

Agree re York. Many locals ( incl my family) rarely go in the centre unless they absolutely have to. It’s carnage as well as being horrendously expensive. I have several relatives who’ve had to move out because rents/house prices were exorbitant. Most of the folk working in the centre are on NMW.

You don’t have shops that just sell clothes pegs, but somewhere that sells general stuff, like B&M.

I’ve lived in tourist towns and it’s a pain in the arse not being able buy basics.

I've always tried to shop in person. I have a bike with a seat for my toddler and have three days a week where it's the two of us/not working so I have time. However the sheer volume of time needed to do the same shopping that you can do from your phone is ridiculous.

For example my son needed new school shoes. It took me let's say 15-20 minutes to get him ready to leave, 25 minutes to cycle to town and lock up the bike. We then visited...I'm going to say 5 or 6 shoe shops, which takes what, 10-15 minutes per shop plus walking between them...so we're about 2 hours to the mission, by which point my 4 year old was done but we hadn't found anything in his size. Cycled to a retail park to try in some supermarkets and still no luck. Ended up going home, buying them online and they were with me the next day. This has happened countless times. No uniform in his size, no coats for my daughter, went to get warm clothes because we were due snow but the shops are full of swimming costumes and sunhats. Don't even get me started on finding maternity clothes you can actually try on before you buy.

There just aren't enough hours in the day to be able to spend all that time and have nothing to show for it. The comparison with the convenience of online shopping is too big.

Christ!! Some of these places definitely don't help themselves.
I was feeling sorry for the councils, but not so much any more.

Our local town's campaign against on street parking has (surprisingly) resulted in the council backing down. 5000 people voted to say they valued an hour's free parking and that they might shop elsewhere if it were withdrawn.

Oldham is going to build thousands of homes in the centre at the same time as trying to improve the night time economy

Feels like a disconnect to me.

No idea what shops are there as parking costs money and there were very few shops when I went pre COVID.
The shopping centre is now council offices in part. They've been building a food court area too. They'd spent £9m on a nearly empty shopping centre and lord knows how much on the changes. The building is at the end of its life as far as I i can see with a massive stained glass roof.

@mumda - I'm going to be honest about this , we lived in Windsor for a bit and had a large Asian population and to me the night time economy was very shit because it was noticeable that Asians didn't go out in the evenings in pubs and restaurants (pubs probably for obvious reasons) - we lived in an area that had a lot of well off Asians too so it wasn't just money- It's not a racist comment either , more just an observation on my part - and I do wonder if the situation in Oldham is similar as I know it has a large Asian population- because if so I think they are flogging a dead horse unfortunately , unless there is a change in demographic.

I live in Leeds in an area that has a large Asian (and Muslim) population. I can't say I've noticed the Asian population not going out in the evening. Is this a thing? Whenever I go to a restaurant there are plenty of Asian families or couples there for dinner. My in-laws are Indian and if they had their way they'd be out for dinner every night!

@SallyWD it was definitely 'a thing' in Windsor - and if you did go to restaurants you rarely saw Asian families - and of course rarely in bars and pubs (which I get as many if not most don't drink as far as I'm aware) - maybe different in the bigger places - although I did notice similar when we lived in Oxford too .

Skipton also has a street market more days than not which always seems popular - some quirky stuff as well as the usual market things. It's about an hour's drive from us and we go every couple of months.

Where I am, the authentic Asian restaurants are Muslim-owned and don't sell alcohol although some of them let you bring your own. They're always busy with Asian families and non-Asians savvy enough to know where the decent food is.

@SevenSeasOfRhye ah it must just be where I've lived then

I think it will depend hugely on the area. Traditionally, the Indian subcontinent was late to the restaurant revolution (*) and among the diaspora from the Indian subcontinent, the idea of “going out to eat” may have taken longer to catch on. In many/most areas, however, I think South Asian diasporas will now be enthusiastic about restaurants. Whether pubs can do well with fewer alcohol drinkers is a tricky one - they do tend to make bigger profit margins from drinks than from food. Perhaps non-alcoholic drinks need to become more exciting and varied.

(*) https://www.quora.com/Why-are-Indians-obsessed-with-homemade-food
It’s important to realize that eating-out as an aspirational thing to do took a while to catch on in the West as well. Until the 20th century, dining-out for posh people was the exceptional rather than the norm - rich men dining at their clubs, for example - and most smart entertainment was done at home, assisted by cheap labor which enabled the rich to have a lot of staff, and even the middle classes to have a maid-of-all-work or two. Eating-out was commoner among the poor, who often lacked decent cooking facilities and tended to eat by the roadside or in small pie houses, pubs etc.

Eating-out as this smart activity for the rich or a special treat for the middle classes (meeting friends, putting on your posh clothes and being “seen” in public) really took off from the early 20th century onwards in the UK, as things like universal education meant that it became harder and harder to hire domestic staff and maids and so on, as you will see in any Agatha Christie novel where there is endless talk about the problem of getting and keeping servants.

India has gone through this same change since Independence (and I bet that the “servant problem” is really biting in some Indian cities now), and I think the older generation of Southeast Asian Brits were influenced by this and felt that cooking was what you did at home. In most parts of the UK, however, things will be changing rapidly.

I also wonder OP about the larger economical impact on their entire UK and also the communities. Retail served a huge employment hole for decades we had thriving and growing town centres that employed so many local people, now that's all gone, for the first time in human history local towns don't really exist and soon def won't! Is this contributing to the further decline of those local communities esp the poorest who don't usually drive! And because of the boom of the internet most of us buy are clothes online from the likes of many Chinese suppliers, I do worry that we as a country have totaly failed on the retail front for ourselves and given all our money over to sellers like this and to those on eBay and Amazon. I think it's just been the natural thing that people feel they need the best price but essentially we've shot ourslevs in the foot because we've wiped our own retail economy out and killed off all our own town centres and nail in the coffin for work for our children. Where have all those people ended up working instead, are more on the dole and benefits where have they gone. I dare say it but I do worry that this country is heading down a road to nowhere and it really does worry me! I used to live in one of the most buzzing towns in the midlands, I left 10 yrs ago, it's awful ghost town full of some dodgy characters, no one goes there, I live 10 miles away with a smaller town with a lot more going on, than the main city centre. It's down welll because older more educated locals have put their own time in to council committees and events and because it's a wealthier area we do have some nice bars and places to eat, not loads but enohhh for the occasional night out. I think most younger people due to Instagram and their image will occ nip to local towns now instead for a couple of drinks as again the costs are still high unless more local kids can afford it or they go in to larger city centres. Where though are the huge market of younger less well off youth spending their time drinking, do they even go out? Just makes you wonder how it's all changed but I see local towns being shut soon unless a totally new concept is adopted - I feel like the fun indoor karting, karting concepts with bars would appeal more locally but if the rents remain high the costs to customers remain high and in areas with poverty near to towns like this it won't work!

How is this change bettering or worsening these poorer communities, and there are so so many of them nowadays because a lot of these people's grandparents prev worked and owned markets and stalls in the towns don't anymore.

Just throwing a few names out there but the big ones that will always keep going but may also have felt the effect as well will be likes of Birmingham, Liverpool, Manchester, London and Leeds and Edinburgh and York, most smaller cities like Bolton, Wigan, Stoke on Trent, Huddersfield those sorts of places eilll be the ones to be totally dead soon expect the retail parks, it's the prettier market towns where the wealthier reside and a large proportion of that being retired or close to retired that give more of their time to their local communities rather than to their less well off declining closest town/cities. I suppose 20+ yrs ago there wasn't much need to do this locally in your town as the larger medium sized towns had a lot on offer and it was easier to go to them than the big cities mentioned above which you'd do for a special day out. It looks like retailers will need to offer smaller more compact models in the medium towns if they want people to potentially use them as people are visiting a lot less medium size towns and infrequently visiting their cities but are they visiting their local town enough for this to take off...where I am I'd appreciate a smaller local primark but with the best bits likely to buy in it rather than going to the awful medium towns I have to to get primark for example, I'm lucky to have an M&S and a decent sized supermarket but we don't have a Holland & Barrett, we don't have a couple of the fast food places that are busy like a smaller McDonald's which would def be used somewhere close to our town accessible by a car for drive thru! I like most hate go

Sorry hit send! I feel like if those nicer smaller market towns introduced a smaller shopping centre concept with units half or a third of the size than the usual model, offering the bits people buy mostly online the rent would be cheaper as the units are smaller, people do pass these local towns more frequently particularly older retired and families at a wknd and they would def make money and get out of the middle size towns as it's gone!

When I walk round our local market town I miss a small primark, a small Thornton's, a decent health shop, some of the bigger named eateries but in a smaller concept!

I think local market towns will be the way forward esp with money being tight it gets people out walking! No car park fees putting people off, local pride more In a growing town, old people will spend more as it's engrained in to them to shop, families will be there at wknds and part timers on their days off with the kids if it has a playground for the kids, a soft play is also welcomed! A small bowling alley would be great, this sort of thing!

@lifeparadox333

I also wonder OP about the larger economical impact on their entire UK and also the communities. Retail served a huge employment hole for decades we had thriving and growing town centres that employed so many local people, now that's all gone, for the first time in human history local towns don't really exist and soon def won't! Is this contributing to the further decline of those local communities esp the poorest who don't usually drive! And because of the boom of the internet most of us buy are clothes online from the likes of many Chinese suppliers, I do worry that we as a country have totaly failed on the retail front for ourselves and given all our money over to sellers like this and to those on eBay and Amazon. I think it's just been the natural thing that people feel they need the best price but essentially we've shot ourslevs in the foot because we've wiped our own retail economy out and killed off all our own town centres and nail in the coffin for work for our children.

I think it goes back beyond town centres. Back in the 70s and 80s, there were virtually small independent shops on every street corner, greengrocers, grocers, butchers, newsagents, bakeries, sweet shops, hardware shops, etc. It was the growth in town centre shopping and in particular national High Street chain stores that started the rot and the end of the traditional "corner shops". People obviously always went to town centre high streets, but also had plenty of "intermediate" options on their street corners for mid week shopping, things they forgot, etc., not to mention widespread home deliveries, not just milk and newspapers, but also small shops (both corner style and High Street) used to do home deliveries of entire weekly shops.

There was first the trend for national chains of high street shops which started the rot as they would compete on price, which started to dominate the high streets pushing out the independents and starting the wholesale closure of "corner shops". Then came along out of town retail, with huge supermarkets etc., which not only damaged the High Street but also was the final nail in the coffin for independent "corner shops". Internet shopping has been the final nail in the coffin for the national high street shopping chains, leaving us with a choice of out of town retail parks/supermarkets or the internet.

@lifeparadox333

It looks like retailers will need to offer smaller more compact models in the medium towns

It's more a matter of whether landlords will split their units into smaller sizes and whether they'll agree to rent them for more affordable rents. A huge proportion of High Street retail premises are held by pension scheme funds, so are pretty much limited in terms of what investment they have to improve/renovate/remodel their real estate and also have to watch liquidity/asset ratios etc which is why they tend to prefer to leave a property empty rather than agree a lower rent (hence rent free periods as incentives rather than longer term lower rentals).