Why the Net has the advantage in the ‘Undies world’
- Shopping blogger Emma Iannarilli
25 per cent of town shops now empty
Thursday 11th February 2010, 11:30AM GMT.
Up to a quarter of shops are standing empty in town centres in the Midlands, a report reveals today.
Wolverhampton has been hit worst with more than 23 per cent deserted after the departure of such names as Woolworths, Dorothy Perkins and Oasis.
The city has the highest vacancy rate of the country’s large retail centres at almost double the national average.
The British Property Federation today said a rise in internet shopping and a lack of investment was to blame.
It is calling on councils to make it easier for entrepreneurs to convert existing shops and increased Government spending to reinvigorate declining retail hubs.
Other areas with high vacancy rates in the region include Stourbridge and Stafford, where around 18 per cent of units are empty; Dudley and Walsall, where around 14 per cent of shops are vacant; Cannock where 12 per cent are unused; and West Bromwich and Kidderminster, where 11 per cent of units are available to let.
The impact of the recession on Britain’s high streets has been laid bare by analysts, Local Data Company.
Its report, which examines the latest figures at December 2009, also shows one in 10 shops are vacant in Birmingham city centre, Solihull, Halesowen and Lichfield.
Some 12.4 per cent stand empty across Britain, according to the survey of more than 700 town centres.
Liz Peace, chief executive of the British Property Federation, warned today: “The next government will need to balance cuts in spending with ideas for reinvigorating regions that have suffered from years of underinvestment.”
But Business Minister Pat McFadden, MP for Wolverhampton South East, rejected the claim that a lack of Government investment was to blame.
He said: “The city has ambitious plans to improve the retail environment and I think they are much-needed if it is going to keep pace with elsewhere.”
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until these white elephants Raglan Street & Temple Street are sorted out who will want to invest in a city Labour neglected for years?!
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Well it wasn’t likely that Patrick McFadden. LABOUR MP for Wolverhampton South East would admit that both Local and National Labour governments have neglected the city for the last 13 years.
If you compare the level of public sector investment in the North East, North West and South Wales (core Labour areas) to that in the Midlands (marginal seats) you will see that those areas have had a massive boost in job creation from government spending.
Wolverhampton has been left to rot by successive governments – never really recovering from the last recession, as industry and manufacturing has been ignored as being things of the past.
Instead ‘consumer spending’ is supposedly the key to prosperity via some perverse reasoning where spending money makes you and the economy better off.
A combination of poor planning, a lack of dynamism and a dearth of skills has left Wolverhampton at rock bottom.
Oh well, as long as they keep the welfare payments up I’m sure there won’t be any riots.
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“The city has ambitious plans to improve the retail environment etc etc”, we all have ambitious plans its immediate action that is required. The majority of the shops that we do have are cheap rubbish and yet what has the council done to entice shopping in Wolverhampton, they put the price of parking up. It is now £2.00 for up top two hours on the Mander centre car park compared with £1.10 for the same amount of time at Telford and of course free at Merry Hill for however long you want to visit, and bath centres have a much better choice of shops, are cleaner and feel safer. I know where I’d rather shop.
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No’3 (Treacle Beaker)
I don’t know if you are aware but the Mander Centre and it’s car park are not owned by the council. In fact, the council have no control over what and private companies charge for their products and services.
For example, can you imagine the council telling Beatties that they have to sell their perfume at a particular price!
I think that you are deluded. I guess that you think it is the council’s fault that it snowed yesterday?
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The original comment is not deluded, it’s actually spot on! The shopping is better elsewhere and parking is free or considerably cheaper!
The Council does have a responsibility for the local economy and so this is something they should be negotiating on with the private sector.
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To Steve Evans – What a nasty tone you have to your email – That may be the case but Fold Street is council owned and cost a fortune even more than the Mander Centre I think, same principle, so don’t patronise me.
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When will shops learn that 9-5 opening times are just too outdated. If you work full-time you can only go shopping on Saturdays when I’m usually busy. As a result I am forced to shop online, in supermarkets or place like merry hill.
I used to love shopping in Wolverhampton but basically I can’t any more because the shops are only open when I’m at work.
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The real reasons for the empty shops are:
1. The Centre has been incarcerated within a rigid boundary that excludes shoppers from it (the inpenetrable ring road).
2. Ridiculous one way systems prevent access to shops.
3. A complete abandonment of “on-street” parking facilities has meant shops approaching the shopping precincts are unable to pick up passing trade.
4. Traditional approach routes have been pointlessly eliminated (such as Great Brickiln Street, Salop Street, North Street, Cleveland Road).
5. The bus station is in the wrong place.
6. A massive expansion of “out of town” shopping has been permitted (contrary to stated policy) which has diluted the business. These “out of town” facilities all encourage the motorist and so “quel surprise”.. motorists shop there rather than the centre.
7. The promised ring road was never completed. Instead a flat (cheap) single layer system is in place which merely acts as a constricter around the Centre. The necessary underpasses and overpasses, clover leaf crossings etc. were never built.
8. Birmingham has been allowed to use free advertising facilities on the BBC (contrary to its charter) in order to promote itself at the expense of surrounding areas. I estimate the value of this free advertising to be worth hundreds of millions of pounds. (If you don’t know what I mean then look at any regional “news” programme. These are simply advertising programmes promoting events in Birmingham).
9. The City has been devastated by the pointless and costly experiment with a pseudo-regional government (WMMCC) which failed but while it had power bled Wton of funds to spend on its appointed headquarters in Brum.
10. Essential businesses have been removed by government intervention and the relatively higher paid jobs that went with them have thus gone… (public transport and water in the public sector)… (various companies bribed to move out, only then to fail, in the private sector)
It is time for some of this money to be repaid. Central Government and Pseudo Regional intervention (now represented by a costly bureaucratic quango) should be undone.
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@ PJW Holland
`5. The bus station is in the wrong place.’
WHAT? Er,where should it be then if not in the centre near the train station?
West Park? Graiseley Flats? Maybe Bentley Bridge even?
We should be told…..
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RAILWAY Station!!!
A bus station, if appropriate, should be attached to the shopping centre.
In fact there is no need for a bus station at all. The buses have the streets to themselves. They can stop there, as they used to. Indeed most buses run empty to the “bus station”. Convoys of empty buses! What a waste. What a mass of unnecessary pollution!
If the WMPTA policy of terminating routes at a bus station were reversed and the old cross town routes (as operated by the far more efficient Wolverhampton Corporation Transport Undertaking) were re-established public transport would be more efficient by far.
Cross town routes remove the need for a focal point for services. All it needs is for routes to pass close to the RAILWAY station and shops. This creates the necessary interchange at zero cost.
The present bus station is neither close to the RAILWAY station nor the shopping centre as it now is. It serves no purpose. It is a collosal waste of space and money. It merely attracts the kind of undesirables mentioned elsewhere in these threads. It presents a most unattractive “welcome” for visitors to the City.
This land could be put to far better use. A conference centre, for example. The coaches could operate from outside Low Level Station and that building could provide the necessary accomodation to host them.
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It’s to late the council having done everything in their power to destroy Wolverhampton.
Whats needed is firstly clean up the streets from rubbish and vomit,and secondly get rid of the bully boy traffic wardens and introduce free car parking.
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Unlike dudley town Wolverhapton has had regeneration money and still cannot compete against Merry hill and Birmingham
but like dudley it will have to down size the shopping area and reinvent itself
chambers of commerce has to do more to attract well paid work thats the only answer
sorry we have to compete!
friends of dudley town centre
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Well it doesnt help that the picture shown for this article is a bleak reminder of why there are so many shop vacancies
A majority of the shops in Wolverhampton centre look run down, out of date, poorly maintained, miserable looking and lack any warmth and safe feeling, not ideal for attracting custom to the area.
The sooner investment is put into the Summer Row project, the Better!
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The increase in large supermarkets has also contributed to the decline. Where I live I have 4 Morrisons, one Tesco and one Asda stores within easy reach. Walsall town centre has also been in rapid decline for a number of years now. Very sad.
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Wolverhampton Town Centre is awful. I always go to Telford, it is mainly indoors and the shops are much better. I have been living here for 20 years and in the 20 years Wolverhampton Town Centre has been in the papers every couple of months with wonderful plans for the town centre and I am still waiting to see it all. We got some stupid fountain instead.
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If Wolverhampton had its own anthem it would probably be ‘Ghost town’ by the specials. Not looking great at the moment, must try harder.
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While I agree with you about parking charges, I’d like to say that the Mander Centre is owned by a London-based company called Propinvest, not by the council.
It does make you wonder why we’ve had all this nonsense about Summer Row when in this city we can’t even fill the units we have.
I try to avoid Wolverhampton city centre (yeah, not “town” as it says in the headline) as much as possible. It feels too dangerous, it’s a mess, there’s no parking and, quite apart from no shops, there’s nothing else to do.
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A fantastic Labour legacy. Well Done. Time to vote with our feet people at the Election. Wolverhampton has been on the decline for decades. The ‘town’ is a dump of rubbish, wasteland, derelict buildings, addicts, beggers and criminals. No wonder there are no decent shops, who wants to go there? Telford and Merryhill are strides infront with cheaper or free parking better security and decent shops. The site of the former Our Price record store in the Mander centre is on a prime corner plot and has been empty for nearly 10 years!
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To improve shopping in Wolverhampton is simple
1 Reduce rents
2 Reduce rates
3 Reduce parking charges
Easy as 1,2,3 (Simples!!)
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Mike’s right.
Lower rates, encourage shop owners. Not chains either, independent shops. Bring people in who want something different. Has anything changed in Wolves apart from shops closing and a new fountain in the last 10 years?
Oh, yes I forgot. Some genius at the council had the idea of putting the street names in the paving slabs. How much did that cost? I had pleasure of kicking an E off ‘Queen St’ around one afternoon that had come loose.
Also. It’s not a good idea to fill vacant shops with cheap shops who blast Basshunter out full blast.
The only thing Wolverhampton has too offer is the ‘ex-Cowboy’.
BUT, a lot of it has come with peoples shopping habits. The rise of retail parks and internet shopping’s killing the highstreets. Unless cities have other things to pull visitors in.
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Well said lad!!!Too much greed and one way vision in this town!
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With Summer Row on hold (after scaring out the tenants that occupied the shop space they wanted)and one of the largest retail centres in the country (Birmingham) less than half an hour away why is anyone surprised that Wolves is the capital of empty shops in England? Maybe they should stop trying to entice the national chain stores and re-invent town as a mix use urban area with housing, bars, food, entertainment and local independent stores?
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I live in Wolves now, it’s pants.
I moved here in May for work. When I meet people in the city centre who travelled from elsewhere, I feel I need to apologise. The best thing about Wolves though is the fact it’s near motorways which can take you out of Wolves to somewhere that isn’t Wolves.
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Follow up to my previous comment. Just been on Mander Centre Website. How stupid it closes at 5.30pm????????? no wonder no-one goes? How are you supposed to go when you work – on Saturday? I have better places to go. Also the latest news, offers and events are blank apart from a gift voucher offer. Come on MC you are not doing yourselves any favours.
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wolves town centre is in ruins left by the council,wolves as a wholre isnt much better ,paid a visit to telford recently shopping is whole lot better experience much more variety of shops puts wolves to shame
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I agree with Mill Funter. But apart from walking down Qu en Street and observing the casual dog mess, what has Wolverhampton got to offer?
A rubbish fountain that just wastes water. The council should have spent the money modernising the man-on-the-horse, perhaps by giving him a mobile and an ipod. That would at least mean the chavaterian residence could relate to the iconic feature.
Also, what’s with the building that has a fancy light show? what a waste of electricity, and I nearly crashed my car when i was partially hypnotised by the slow disco.
Walking around the grey and dismal “city” makes me sad to be alive. And the vast majority of it’s residents resemble something from dawn of the dead.
Tara a bit wasters
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I’ve been a Wolverhampton resident for most of my life, but it is now only the last resort for shopping.
It’s much easier to do food shops on the Internet and the delivery prices are so low now that it costs just as much in petrol and parking fees if you choose to do it in town.
As for the general retail offer in Wolverhampton, it’s appalling! Many of the big brands have left and House of Fraser is the only place worth going and even that is a shadow of the former Beatties store.
I go to Telford or the Bull Ring even though it does cost more to park at the latter, but at least there is much more on offer.
The town centre is also filthy and looks neglected. Comparing Wolves and Brum is like comparing East and West Berlin before the wall came down!
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Wolverhampton was once a lovely place to shop..Sadly now its run down ,neglected,scruffy No decent department stores anymore .Wasting money on fountains does not improve an allmost derelict scruffy city.
I go to Birmingham its clean great shops and you are not afraid to turn corners in case you are accosted by beggars or thieves.
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I used to work and shop in Wolverhampton regularly in the 70′s and 80′s. My vistits in the 0′s were fraught with difficulty, yobs in public areas and muck (though no brass). I visited Redditch shopping centre yesterday. What a difference… bus station, train station interlinked with the shopping areas, parking at reasonable rates with level parking for disabled, all the big names and food outlets and cinema interlinked with shopping areas ( as good if not better than Merry Hill and loads of shoppers). If this “TOWN” can do it why hasn’t a “CITY” (NO CATHEDERAL) like Wolverhampton ?
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On a point of information a City does not have to have a Cathedral, although Wton indeed has a Cathedral Church.
City status is awarded when the monarch issues letters patent. It is entirely a matter of discretion.
Meanwhile Redditch has not had to deal with the massive upheaval that Wton has had to and unlike Wton derives an income from its catchment area… Wton was deprived of this when the recomendations of several parliamentary committees were that the contrived borough of South Staffordshire should have been incorporated within the borough. This gerrymandering of the boundaries is the cause of the neglect.
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Thankyou for your reply, though the explanation about city status was not needed, my comment being rhetorical. The latter part of your post does raise an issue though as it suggest Wolverhampton has no income at all and that Redditch has suffered no upheaval. I would be interested on what basis you make this statement. What income does Redditch get that Wolverhampton does not?
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I think Birmingham is awfully dirty. Dudley is dirty as well. Wolverhampton is a bit cleaner than these two but still not as clean as Halesoewen, Merry Hill and Stourbridge.
I personally hate crowded environment so I hate shopping in Merry Hill and Birmingham in peak time.
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The decline in high street shopping is not exclusive to Wolverhampton.
This is not about bad management but more a sign of things to come-everywhere.
Investing in a new town centre won’t make much difference unless people have money to spend in them.
To judge the quality of Wolverhampton by it’s shopping experience is bizarre and outdated.
Vibrancy through a diverse economy is the future, NOT more indoor shopping centres please!!
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High street retailing is on the decline and will eventualy all but vanish over the next 20 years. Things change it’s unavoidable. Shopping in towns is just so awfull. It’s so much better to drive to a retail park with free parking and you are in out and back home. Very few high street shops can compete with online shopping. They tend to only serve as a place to look at goods then when you have chosen order it online for a better price. Supermakets are so huge and the range so large that it’s just convienient. Why would anyone invest in a retail business.Its too expensive and shows little growth potential.People complain about the high street being full of cheap rubbish. Get used to it with the minimum wage fast becomming the maximum wage. Cheap rubbish is all most people can now afford. That’s why £1 shops are booming and “Quality” names are fast becomming a thing of the past.We are living through a revolution of employment and spending. There is simply no way back.
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car parking prices are over the top you cant afford to shop as long as you would like in fear of over priced parking . i can’t understand why certain money machines are put in places that make you feel vulnerable .
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well we all know why Halesowen sand stourbridge are not dirty because its dudley councils tory strongholds but everywhere else its a tip!
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It upsets me to see what has happened to Wolverhampton over the last couple of decades.
What was once a vibrant and colourful city has become a dranb shadow of its former self.
It is painful to say this as I have always championed Wolverhampton to others.
I moved overseas in the early 90′s and have been back home (Yes, I still call it home) on several occasions, most recently in 2007.
On each occasion, I have been saddened by the continuing degredation of what was once a great place to visit, work and live in.
When I was growing and during my early workig life, I lived not far fom Wolverhampton and it was always a pleasure to go shopping at the weekend – Unfortunately this was not the case when I visited a couple of years ago.
Cold, grey, dirty and soul-less … Sadly, I couldn’t wait to get out of the place.
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Why would any company want to invest in a ”City” that is rapidly declining and who’s council have not noticed yet?
Council leader Neville Patten perhaps this might help explain why YOUR city came bottom in a recent survey.
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Retail business can only survive when customers spend money. If the area does not look inviting then people won’t go there. 9-5 hours don’t work any more. I live in the Middle East. The shopping malls are modern attractive and everywhere is open until 1.00 am.
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Delusions of grandeur.
For decades Wolverhampton and its people have expected that they should have more facilities (be it shops, public transport or whatever)than the much larger neighbouring boroughs such as Dudley and Sandwell, plus the higher population Walsall.
The current number of empty shops could be seen as a “correction” to gross overprovision of shops for a city of 247,000. So, despite being given favorable public transport (and public swector jobs) funding compared to its neighbours, Woklverhampton is now sufferring an overdue reduction in shopping facilities.
Summer Row should NOT go ahead as it will damage the City Centre existing shops (mmore will become empty) further as well as damaging shops in other nearby important centres.
Empty shops statistics : 24% Wolverhampton, 14% Walsall.
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There is a shining light amongst all this gloom.
Judging from the posts here, it is quite clear that people still care about Wolverhampton.
Residents and ex-residents alike.
(I moved in the 1980′s to London but come back regularly to visit family etc )
Would I consider living in Wolverhampton after all these years?
Yes, I would.
The town that I left is now a new city and has changed for the better.
The future is not lost.
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