Restrictions on out-of-Town Retail Units
An article caught my eye the other day regarding the refusal to life the ‘bulky goods sale restriction’ that is on the retail units at the Parc y Llyn site on the outskirts of Aberystwyth. The reason why this article interested me was because the amount of disused units there at the site and I was quite surprised to hear that the restriction wouldn’t be lifted to attract new businesses to the area.
Of course I’m new to this sort of thing so I had to do my research on why the planning inspector ‘Gwyneed Thomas’ would rule not to life the restriction. Find below my findings on why the restriction should be and perhaps shouldn’t be lifted.
The reason why Mr Thomas ruled what he did was because he felt it could damage to the town centre and the proposed shopping development on Mill Street (In 5 years time). Usually retail units placed on the outside of town are done so as they usually offer ‘bulky goods’ which require cars to take goods away (Televisions from Currys for Example) and out of town sites are perfect as they can often offer ample car park spacing which the town can’t. These units are good if they’re able to provide goods that the town centre cannot.
The problem comes when/if a bulky goods restriction is lifted; this will mean that businesses that offer clothing and other small goods can move to the out of town retail units. This then creates competition between these units and the town-centre shops as goods are ‘comparable’ and can be compared on price etc. Retail stores on the outskirt of town might benefit from lower overheads and therefore lower prices which give them a competitive advantage over inner town shops. People may then tend to visit stores outside of town instead of bothering going into the town therefore putting businesses potentially out of business and creating lots of empty shops… poor run-down town image etc.
Although there’s a proposed retail development for Mill Street in the town it won’t be ready for another 5 years and similar to the major redevelopment on the high street which would see the old post-office building knocked down could be scrapped… and so might not even go ahead. You can see why they wouldn’t want to remove the bulk goods restriction but this damages stores outside of town… MFI’s old unit has been empty for 18 months, former Tiles R Us and Richley’s etc. With Business Rates in town increasing as much as 100% + (Such as Kraxi’s on Pier Street) it’s putting many shops out of business in town so surely an injection of retail businesses is what the town/local economy is in real dire need for, not more restrictions.
Matalan, Peacocks (clothing retailers) have crept into the Ystwyth Precinct but of course that’s in the heart of the town centre.
Many theorists believe that these situations needs a full and proper investigation whereby restrictions can be removed on outer town retail units if they’re below a certain ‘comparable good’ / ‘Performance of Town Centre’ percentage that wouldn’t have much effect on the town centre. So perhaps an independent report needs to be carried out on the impact of this on the town centre.
Written by Rhys Gregory, Third Year Management and Business Student, Aberystwyth University.
In response to: http://www.cambrian-news.co.uk/news/i/8232/
Reference to the readings of Google Books
