Pride in place

[Spartacus]

There was mention yesterday, which may have slipped by some, that the Goverment is about to launch a "pride in place" £5 billion investment into city and town centres to boost high streets, parks and public spaces.

I can see two flaws with this.

Firstly it's a sticking plaster over a problem that the government doesn't seem to want to tackle. The decline of town centres is largely down to the impact caused by large players including the Internet giants, (non bricks and morter), who seem not to be paying the appropriate amount of taxes or even bypassing them by sending small value items into the UK. Until the playing field is leveled to give high streets an equal chance, consumers will naturally go for the best price. This would also increase the tax revenue the Chancellor has to play with and keep money in the local economy .

Second issue I see is that when we are all staring down the barrel of a potential £30 billion tax hike in the budget, is this the right time to be announcing even more spending. Feels that maybe waiting till the economy is tracking better would be prudent. 

Of course the argument could be, improving the town centre realm , improves consumer confidence to shop locally, but unless the first point is fixed it could be a case of throwing bad money after good. 

 BBC News - Which areas are due to get share of £5bn funding boost? - BBC News

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c1mx8vr2gr1o

 

[Angelina]

when high streets are filled with betting shops, pound shops, empty sites and just run down - as is the case in many places - of course people don't want to go there - either for essentials or to hang out or shop-shop.

a multi-fronted approach is exactly what is needed - upgrade the areas, encourage footfall, encourage new shops etc - BUT that has to be supported by consumers - who need to stop being lazy with amazon and home deliveries and make better choices.

 

 

[Jenijenjen]

It is not laziness that sends me shopping on the Internet, it's also the better choice, better prices, and also the availability of items impossible to obtain either locally or in central London. I try to avoid Amazon for both ethical and quality issues. 

The internet has enabled many small businesses to trade which would not have been possible before, surely that's a good thing. 

The genie is well out of the bottle.

[Angelina]

If that better choice, better price and better availability were available locally instead of being delivered - what choice would you make?

Not everyone makes ethical choices yet consumers have all the power.

If you realised that your changing your consumer decisions could directly impact the environment around you, would you make different choices?

[Jenijenjen]

I'm not going to answer a hypothetical question about an imaginary outcome.

[Angelina]

I'll take that as a No then.

It's not as "imaginary" as you think, to understand the impact online shopping has on communities and local environments. That's well known.

[Jenijenjen]

10 minutes ago, Angelina said:

 

It's not as "imaginary" as you think, to understand the impact online shopping has on communities and local environments. That's well known.

This is not what I am referring to as imaginary, more that to reverse this trend shoppers would be prepared to go back to high street shopping

- To pay more

- Endure the irritation, inconvenience and time spent real life shopping

- and to have far, far far less choice. To shop in bricks and mortar shops means the shopkeeper is to a certain extent making preliminary choices for us.

As I said before, the genie is out of the bottle.

[Spartacus]

48 minutes ago, Jenijenjen said:

This is not what I am referring to as imaginary, more that to reverse this trend shoppers would be prepared to go back to high street shopping

- To pay more

- Endure the irritation, inconvenience and time spent real life shopping

- and to have far, far far less choice. To shop in bricks and mortar shops means the shopkeeper is to a certain extent making preliminary choices for us.

As I said before, the genie is out of the bottle.

Would you also say that the £5billion investment won't have the desired impact as shoppers prefer online ? 

[alice]

Internet will never replace face-to-face shopping   These  derelict  shopping centres still exist but they’re filled with crap shops  antisocial behaviour et cetera et cetera we don’t have them here that’s why we’re not getting the money

currently about 25% of are spending is online. 

Edited 2 hours ago by alice
info

[Jenijenjen]

@Spartacus It seems a very complex subject and I have no knowledge of the places awarded money but pride of place has many more ingredients than retail. 

Edited 3 hours ago by Jenijenjen

[malumbu]

We've all noticed how once grotty town centres have improved and gentrified over the last decade or so, Deptford, Peckham, Honor Oak, Brockley.  Just count the bars and coffee shops.  Catford is going that way and Lewisham and Forest Hill next.  We are in an affluent area, and the above is more relevant to forgotten towns and areas. 

[Angelina]

That’s right. Some places are very grim and will definitely benefit. People need nice community spaces and safe places to shop and wander about

[Spartacus]

Is there a view from people on "should Internet only based retail businesses be taxed in a fairer way to level the field for bricks snd moryer businesses?" 

[Sephiroth]

1 hour ago, malumbu said:

We've all noticed how once grotty town centres have improved and gentrified over the last decade or so, Deptford, Peckham, Honor Oak, Brockley.  Just count the bars and coffee shops.  Catford is going that way and Lewisham and Forest Hill next.  We are in an affluent area, and the above is more relevant to forgotten towns and areas. 

Of course as these places revive, for the reasons you correctly state, there is no shortage of people moaning “just what we need. Another coffee shop or bar!”

and of course there are limits.  But social spaces are the future of revived town centres as much as or more than traditional retail 

Face to face shopping is important and a good thing but landlords are not going to swallow the lower rents that are required to revive retail in town centres 

shopkeeers don’t help themselves either sometimes. Yer famous butcher in Dulwich spent more time complaining about congestion charge in Kennington instead of saying how that led to his business booming in Dulwich 

On the other hand again look  what happened when his butcher shop took off in lordship lane.  Other people started moaning about the queues!! 
Successful business!!! Boo hiss

 

sometimes I do wonder if the “left behind” find themselves in that position not because of govt policy or newcomers  but because they will never be happy and become pains in the hole which business and other people avoid