A race to the bottom, but I wouldn’t blame Amazon. Large multinational chains were hollowing out high streets and making them less pleasant before online shopping.

As another comment said, councils and government should treat high streets more like public commons, prioritising independent businesses and making places distinctive.

What frustrates me is that even prosperous areas with new developments rarely make space for small businesses. Instead, we get “private equity” chain.

Ugh, one I saw recently was Bristol University’s new campus by Temple Meads. The wall between the campus and station could have been lined with small, affordable units for independent and student-run businesses. Would love to browse a few interesting shops or grab a decent sandwich before catching a late train. 23m for a new entrance but where are the opportunities. (This is based off the media announcements, not walked through there yet)

In many cases you can’t find out who the owner is. There’s too many shell companies involved.

These firms don’t care about occupancy, they care about the resale book value.

Business tax rates are based on those property valuations.

There’s no chance the property companies will reduce the value of their portfolio to reduce burden for tenants they don’t care about.

Then you have foreign online retailers like Amazon and Temu able to use complex multinational tax avoidance schemes and fake products to undercut the high street.

How can you compete if Amazon can deliver a knock off from China, that you can’t legally sell, faster than you can stock a real one into the shop, and at half the price?

I'm a Frenchman but I hold no particular dumb grudge against the English, I actually like them, their style, their music, what I perceive as their refinement as much as their capacity to be hilarious, quick with the banter, overall good lads

so a few years ago, I booked a trip to London, then a train to Northampton cause I wanted to see the city where all the good shoe manufacturers are based (I own a pair of Crockett and Jones and enjoy other brands like Cheaney, Trickers, etc).

what a BRUTAL wake up call, what was on paper a thriving manufacturing town with rich history turned out to be a completely derelict place, with boarded windows in the main streets, beggars, dollar shops, litter absolutely everywhere and the signs that the golden age of the town is LONG gone. I don't know what happened there, recession, Brexit, I really don't know but I ended up taking the train back to London earlier than anticipated, completely shocked by what I saw

I live in a little community outside Boulder, and we have a nice little main street area, only a few blocks, which is a good size for our community. There's a few restaurants, a cafe, a community space, some boutiques, all of which encourage foot traffic and liveliness. But recently, a little book shop devoted to kids books was forced out due to increased rent demands, and an architecture firm moved in. What was previously drawing maybe 100+ people a day to the main street now attracts 5 employees who work in a closed office. Not the end of the world for the main street, but if a few more shops make a similar decision it will be completely dead.

Add coffee shops and restaurants nearby, help promote casual entertainment venues like mini golf, community theatre, and weekend markets.

Grow from there based on the type of demand that appears, keep business rates low for the area.

They say it can't be done, but when that last shop closes right now there will be no choice.

To combat the dereliction and anti social behaviour they would have to rebuild anyway, and it will cost them more later than gradual repurpose/ investment.

German high-street retail establishments are open a ton more hours every week despite not being allowed to open on most Sundays.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wn3p7by5F0I

A lot of what he said about the root causes of why UK high streets were dying seems to have been accurate, and this is before the double whammy of the Covid pandemic and the increase in interest rates to tackle inflation (as well as the mini-budget crisis of 2022), plus energy prices for shops and pubs in the UK are really high.

Retail parks are so popular in the UK because being able to visit a couple of stores in the park and do your shopping in one hit, plus the cheap/free parking, and that is ultimately what UK shoppers want - convenience.

If councils want to rescue their high streets, they may have to get more creative when it comes to getting new stores to open, beyond just offering a respite on business rates.

More than half of the shops are retail chains with stupidly bright colors that clash with the local architecture. The other half is cheap-looking stores and bad restaurants.

To illustrate my point, I picked a random town center on google maps:

https://www.google.com/maps/@52.5494903,0.0881482,5a,55.8y,2...

This has a costa coffee, a subway, a ladbroke, a betfred, a bright vape shop, a haart real estate agency, a bunch of hair salons, etc.

To be fair, this town has also a number of local shops that look decent. But overall the aesthetics of it is highly depressing to me.

Look at the triovet clinic, this is a local place that wants to look like a national chain.

Only yesterday, I drove into London and walked nearly 20k steps to visit the various locations on my itinerary. Not every inch of a space need be a road, but banning cars and insisting everyone walk or use public transport also isn’t the answer. We need roads adjacent to large, pedestrianised areas.

The specific problem with the UK is how London-centric and unreliable our transport infrastructure has become. Not to mention driving can be incredibly fun! Much more so than cycling when it’s pouring with rain, you’re going to a fancy event, or have a large amount to move.

Rents are high, parking difficult, the products undifferentiated (carbon copy list of the same 15-20 chain franchises), not unique. After all of that, I'll assume prices are no better and may be worse than online retail.

I'm not sure what the answer is, as retail is not my area of expertise. However I think that if there is a solution it will have something to do with people, community, and offering a specifically local experience. Not one which is purely a chore, and I think it will involve much more than just "convenience".

There's also the fact that property developers, commercial landlords, and institutional lenders frequently favor corporate tenants over independent operators. Rising property values and high commercial rents also price out local, independent owners.

However, there have been some exceptions under the New Urbanism banner where you see localized revivals. Some cities (like Jersey City) cap chain occupancy of retail space to 30%. Portland and Austin use zoning rules to make commercial real estate unattractive to chains. Commercial community land trusts can also be used to freeze rent and make space more affordable for local businesses. I doubt there's a one-size-fits-all approach.

They also need some sort of tax forgiveness if they are to be at all competitive with the major online retailers who pay very little effective tax - which isn't really on them but on national governments to level the playing field.

What shops would you suggest could be added? Most people are buying larger items and clothes online or in chain retail park stores.

My small town has multiples of all of these but also many nice cafes/bars/restaurants and a butchers, bakers, a small market and fruit and veg, a couple of diy/hobby shops as well as 3 supermarkets, a library etc. There are even a couple of clothes stores and some pound shop type places.

I can't really see much of a change coming here or how it could be much better. Our 2 nearest city centres have a bit more variety but of course are mainly chain stores. People go out for an experience rather than shopping and this had already started well before covid hit.

EDIT: Interesting they chose Rotherham as an example, of course if they'd chosen Harrogate, Oxford, Durham, Bath etc the story would have been quite a bit different...

- asset prices don’t support ROI on low volume / low margin shops - I’m not saying ok, but when you say would I buy this shop and rent it to myself - too often the answer is no

- virtuous cycles / density - and at much easier to open a business next to another successful/ complimentary business - i want the butcher, coffee shop, dry cleaner, wine shop, gourmet shop, pub, bakery etc all right near each other I don’t want to make a special trip for each.

- these shops need to be open past 5/6pm!

People just don't want to walk around places when they can drive and buy everything in one place.

"They do it because they can", this is the best explanation in so many cases, this not the exception.

Councils trying to extract as money as possible from shoppers via parking companies doesn't help either.

Zero info on who the government hundreds of millions is going towards to help the problem (let me guess: a bunch of nonprofits who won't solve the problem).

But yeah, UK main streets have a problem.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rotherham_child_sexual_exploit...

If it's supposed to be a display of a city's finest... we're not doing very well.

People don't understand the scams but they smell it. They know how they remember things and they know that everything is getting worse not better.

I dare our governments to try and draft us into another war, literally dare them, even a war to defend our actual land - people have nothing to fight for and will turn their weapons on perceived perpetrators. It's brewing. This slow decline is painfully visible to people.

If I go to my local high streets I either cannot park at all (all residents only permits or disabled or taxis only or bus stops etc) or I have to pay eye watering fees - e.g. £1 or 2 per 15 minutes. Council parking wardens will be out prowling looking for infractions and giving you a £80 fine without any grace period.

...Or I just go to a shopping center like Brent Cross and park for free with zero hassle.

Yes I can walk or take the bus to the high street, but that will turn a quick 20 minute errands I to a 100-120 minute roundtrip, with the discomfort of doing it with shopping bags on the return journey (and the buss will cost you more than parking and fuel, while being slower, less convenient, and less pleasant)

For what it is worth, I don't feel like crime or drugs are a concern, at least not in my part of London.

No, it's that I don't like the council and central government turning a blind eye to obvious crime fronts because they're desperate for the tax. Don't call me a bigot or xenophobe.

I would prefer them to be knocked down for housing frankly, as many town centres are close to useful train stations. The council can then use the council tax

Councils are supporting the don't build any housing any where mandate. It is such an obvious use of the land it's crazy. We still have to delusionally play along with ideas about how to "regenerate the high street".

Case in point. Huddersfield is currently "regenerating" its town borrowing huge sums for a new library and new markets etc instead of just flattening the town and replacing it with housing. The railway line is also having a major upgrade. The timing is literally perfect. Another own goal. But hey a lot of employment was generated and I'm sure the mandate to employ local didn't mean a lot of backhanders....

People will move to a shithole if it has good transport links to jobs, which Huddersfield has. Look at Romford for example. The council has sold off loads of land for flats and is selling more. All because of the new Elizabeth Line

Guess what the result is when 10,000s people with good jobs move in to an area? Demand for shops and services!

Local business owners are taxed to death.

Meanwhile, multinationals with HQs in tax havens roll in and set up national branches. The local branches pay their HQs for imaginary "services" and "rights", allowing them to operate practically tax-free in the country.

Good luck staying open little guy. We're lucky we still have vape shops and nail parlours.

So a lot of high-earners would now have to pay UK taxes on worldwide income. So they left the country or only stay there mininal amount of days to not be considered resident.

Many high street businesses were working for these people with tons of disposable income.

Also criminal situation was little better when these high-profile people were roaming London streets. No one wanted something happen to them.