Free parking and lower rates - now that might help town centres!

***

New Start Magazine report on the increasing problem of a declining independent retail sector noting that:

“Vacancies have continued to increase over the last two quarters and overall shop vacancy has nearly doubled in England and Wales since the end of 2008. More than 12% of shops were empty across Great Britain between July and December last year”

Partly this reflects the impact of a very severe recession on the sector. It is not surprising that retailers struggle and especially independent retailers with low margins and little scope to reduce staffing or argue with the landlord about rent levels. The concern we should all have – a concern expressed in the Clone Towns reports – is that regardless of the cycle of growth and recession, the traditional high street is in decline. Indeed, it is already the case that many secondary centres are barely sustained by a convenience store, a building society branch and a couple of hairdressers.

It seems reasonable therefore to discuss the role of purpose of town centres and why their retail role is declining. A while ago I wrote that:

“Main Street is not simply a place of commerce – a shopping centre. Nor is it (as if in some Soviet dream) just a place for formal events and celebrations. It is a place of engagement and co-operation between merchants, consumers and “ancillary actors”. It is alive.

The driver to the success of Main Street isn’t the shop – although to hear us talk about town centres you would think that – it is the relationship we have with that place and the space it provides for the events and activities of our lives. In Bradford, when Pakistan win at cricket, hundred of fans head for the local centres. Not to shop but to share their happiness at victory.

Yet we distrust such a use for the spaces of our town centres. Many of us grumble about public drinking, about young people gathering together, about hen parties and stag dos. And we certainly dislike political campaigns and religious promotion (unless of course it’s an official and state-sanctioned occasion) – to the point of complaining about these activities.”

Simply talking about shopping misses the point – shops are there because the customers are there not the other way round. In suggesting ways forward, I argued that rather than controls, what town centres needed was programming, animation. But there is a further, practical issue illustrated by this:

“Free on-street car parking spaces in Bradford city centre look set to be scrapped.

The news was immediately condemned by traders as a further body blow in their fight to attract custom.

Only last week a study revealed that the city centre has the second highest proportion of vacant shops in the country.”

So the customer has to pay to go shopping in the town centre – something they don’t have to do out-of-town. Whether at the supermarket, in the retail park or at regional centres like Meadowhall and Trafford Park, we get to park for free. Despite this, local councils – urged on by central government – continue to promote extensions to on street parking charges, congestion charging and even the exclusion of cars from centres. Is it any surprise we go elsewhere?

But it’s worse. For all its rhetoric on supporting town centres. For all the planning policy discussions on hierarchies and sequential tests, out-of-town retailers have a significant financial advantage – the property taxes they pay are half or less than those of the town centre retailer. Our tax regime supports supermarkets. By way of illustration look at one small town – Uttoxeter:

“Town centre traders' business rates are nearly double that of Tesco – despite pulling in only half the supermarket giant's turnover.

The Post & Times revealed last week that the out-of-town chain store takes 50p of every pound spent in Uttoxeter.

But Government figures show the company's business rates are 46 per cent less than the combined total paid by shopkeepers in the centre.

Tesco forks out £386,000 each year for its Town Meadows Way site, while the 145 shopkeepers in The Maltings shopping precinct, High Street, Carter Street and Market Place stump up £714,000.”

So while we are right to look – as I suggested – at town centres as:

"1. places of performance – planned or otherwise
2. centres of culture not temples to shopping
3. a locus for excitement and discovery rather than the workaday
4. as venues for communal celebration, sharing and festivity"

…we also need to look at providing easier access including free parking and at removing the enormous tax advantage we are giving to out-of-town retailers. It would be a simple matter to drop business rates in designated town centres by 90% - and the impact would be immediate and beneficial. And local councils can remove parking charges on-street and drop car park charges straightaway - again to immediate benefit (and probably political advantage too!).

...