Councils have long chased the unprotected business rates as a source of revenue. Approving over supply of retail space within their boundaries that had no basis in demand, often in partnership with developers. The idea was simple, especially for the decaying industrial towns and cities, replace industry with retail. The execution was woeful, retail retail retail - no capacity for the holistic needs of consumers - food and entertainment. Towns would compete with one another for business… a real if you build it they will come approach.
Initially these shopping centres focused on our town and city centres but the rise of retail parks and out of town shopping centres provided consumers with easy car access, businesses with easy access for their lorries and the councils didn’t much care so long as they could collect business rates from somewhere. Everyone was happy. Well mostly. Except the high street and the small local businesses that have always been it’s life blood - these weren’t the business these soulless retail parks wanted, they want national businesses to commit to taking up space on a national level - you’ve only got to look at the repetitive nature of them.
I’m not entirely sure who owns the land, in some cases it’s the pension/investment funds - banks themselves wouldn’t naturally want to - unfortunately they may end up with little choice as these businesses go under. Obviously the pandemic has exasperated the plight of retail in this country, but it was already in terminal decline.
How do you solve it? That’s the big question. There is no single simple solution - if there was they’d have solved it long ago. There may not even be a solution. It boils down to what I think stops me wanting to head in to town rather than the retail park. Firstly there aren’t any shops in my nearest, very deprived, town that make me want to head into it. As it’s deprived there are lots of people with issues bobbing around town, another reason not to venture in. It used to be very affluent like many towns, the decaying façade pays tribute to a time past, the last department store that had stood there for over 100 years shuttered before the pandemic. Co-op and other nationals had long since fled. The weekly market no longer provides a reason to head in. The chips are worth it but the birds attack you so don’t bother any more. I’d probably start by slashing business rates to encourage new startups to setup shop in our towns to try and get that footfall again, the high street is not what it once was where we would head for all our needs, it now needs a great combination of shops, food and entertainment to entice people in. Like you say all that takes huge investment and courage and even that won’t guarantee success. In Scotland they muted banning new retail parks but it feels like that horse has long bolted.
Back to the thread, wasn’t Milton Keynes supposed to be a 15 minute city? Everything broken into 1mile square blocks that were to serve every need and form their own communities. Those communities then formed together to be the identity of the city. How did that work out?
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