- The fact that more people own cars now has now made a more mobile population who come and go out of Cambridge.
- Marriage has increased the spending power because there income is now combined.
- Demands going up for covered shopping area with good parking.
- Majority of Cambridge are going to places such as Lakeside at Thurrock (near Dartford River Crossing Brent Cross), Queensgate Centre in Peterborough.
- Crime increase has a caused a number of people who want to move out to the villages. Such people are likely to prefer shopping out of town.
The anchor stores in the Cambridge City Centre such as Marks & Spencer, Boots, and John Lewis are the stores that bring people in. In order for these stores to run there must be a certain population in the area. This is known as threshold population.
New Developments
Lion Yard
The Lion Yard (See Pic.1) was opened in 1975. It was in fact named after the Red Lion hotel. The south side of Petty Cury to St. Tibbs row, the Guild Hall and St. Andrews Street became the Lion Yard Arcade. The structural plan was to demolish the old buildings and shops to make room for the new arcade and multi – story car park. The old area included the Civic Restaurant (cheap for locals and students), a large fresh fish shop, a ladies dress shop, a Chinese Restaurant, the YMCA and the Red Lion hotel. The council did not consult the public very well, which resulted in conflict because there would be a large block if you like replacing part of a historic landmark in Cambridge. However it has been accepted. Shops include HMV, Dixons and H. Samuel’s. The central library was moved there from the Guild Hall.
The Grafton Centre
After the Lion Yard, the Grafton Centre (See Pic.2 and 3) was built in 1984. The queen opened it. It was built in the Kite area, which was known as the second centre on a Brownfield site of Cambridge. Fitzroy Street, East Road and Burleigh Street surround the Grafton Centre. The Structural plan was to demolish the Victorian houses, pubs and shops around to make room for the new arcade. It was much larger than the Lion Yard and Fitzroy Street and Burleigh Street were to be pedestrianized. Again it caused conflict from local people because the demolishing of the Victorian houses in the Kite area was not a popular idea with the locals. However, the design of it keeps within the area and the locals learned to live with it. There were lots of new specialist shops including C & A and Debenhams. This lead to the advent of the new specialist shops Laurie McConnals in Fitzroy Street and the Co-op in Burleigh Street shutting down.
The second phase was opened in 1995. It became the largest shopping arcade in Cambridge. In the second phase the infrastructure includes a new multi-screen cinema (See Pic. 4) and an eating area surrounded by small Cafes and restaurants. There are two large car parks one is a multi story. Anchor stores now include Next and BHS, Debenhams, Boots and H & M. On the pedestrian side out on Fitzroy Street the anchor stores are Iceland and Habitat.
Other Developments
Other developments include the Beehive area, with the anchor stores being Asda, JJB sports and Homebase. There has also been a redevelopment on Newmarket Road with new stores being Argos, Boots, PC World and Currys. The new Tesco is right opposite this new development. Around this area the parking is free and this brings in a lot of customers.
Future Developments
Coral Park
Coral Park was an Industrial estate with few shops; all the shops have now been demolished. It is a Brownfield site situated just out of the central area of the city.
I conducted a brief interview with a friend (See Matthew Glass). Together we interviewed Mr. Thompson who works for the Cambridge City Planning Department. Below are the questions and answers as a result of this interview:
Q. Is Coral Park going to become a new shopping development?
A. Yes indeed. Work is already underway.
Q. Are there going to be many new shops if so how many?
A. Yes there will be plenty of new shops; right now the number is 8.
Q. What kinds of shops will they be?
A. The shops will be selling things for people to buy in bulk. We are not trying to compete with the city centre.
Q. Will there be an area designated for food?
A. I’m glad you asked that question. Yes there will be a small drive – thru.
Q. Will the current Industrial areas still be there?
A. Unfortunately no. The only one to stay will be the Royal Mail Company.
Q. How easy will we be able to access it?
A. Access will be very easy. It will be accessible from both Coldhams Lane and Newmarket Road.
Q. When do you plan to open it?
A. It will in fact be built in phases and we plan to start work in springtime of April 2003.
The Grafton Centre Phase 3
I conducted another brief interview with a friend (acknowledged by Matthew Glass). This time in aid of finding out more about phase 3 of the Grafton Centre. I think it gives a clear view of what exactly is happening. This time the interview was held with Mr Everett who works for the Grafton Centre management offices. Below are questions and answers:
Q. Is the Grafton Centre going to have a phase 3 to it?
A. Yes but right now, we haven’t got past the planning plateau.
Q. Are there going to be many new shops if so how many?
A. There will be plenty of new shops but I’m not quite sure on the number.
Q. What kinds of shops will they be?
A. The shops will be of much higher class than those of phase 1 and 2.
Q. Will there be any more areas designated for food?
A. I don’t think so as the Grafton Centre is well equipped in that area.
Q. Where exactly will the third phase be?
A. Where the lorry park is which connects on to Burleigh Street.
Q. How easy will it be to access phase 3 and if so where?
A. Shops such as Pine furniture shop through Vision Express will be demolished and that will in effect leave easy access to phase 3.
Q. When do you plan do start building?
A. To my knowledge, work is scheduled to get underway at the end of this year.
With Robert Sayle moving to Burleigh Street in April 2004, the £1 million scheme for improvements will be as follows:
- New pedestrianized areas. With new seating areas too.
- A central sort of area will emerge and this will include a new pizza restaurant and a pole with very attractive lighting.
- On Fitzroy Street, the shops from the kiosk to Lunn Polly and all other shops that connect including Iceland will be redeveloped. This has caused a conflict with the local people because they were not consulted very well and Iceland is the only food store in the area so the locals are not happy about that.
The Grand Arcade
There have been proposals sent to the Cambridge City Council in aid of redeveloping Robert Sayle and connecting shops in St. Andrews Street situated in the centre of town. These proposals have already been accepted and planning permission has been granted. The existing multi – story car park will be there. The structural plan will be to construct a total of fifty new very high quality shops and on top of that, a new car park as well. It will be known as the Grand Arcade (See Plan1).
There will be a walkway, which will link it with Lion Yard. The Arcade will be from Downing Street to the Lion Yard also to St Andrews Street down to the Corn Exchange As a result St. Andrews Street will be pedestranized, which should cause more traffic. The Crowne Plaza will not be affected by construction although the multi – story car park will be renovated to modern standards. Ease of shopping will be so much better. There will be a wide range of cafes and bars. When building is done Robert Sayle will be much bigger than it’s current size. The development will also facilitate a new park and ride scheme for south – west of Cambridge and relocation of the current Magistrates Court to a new location within the city.
These proposals will create new retail and leisure developments with better public transport for Cambridge. The scheme will also provide a revitalised and a new focal point (motif) for the centre of Cambridge. This proposal will in effect cause a multiplier effect and will start to attract big retail companies. This is going to attract more people and like I said more people would obviously result in more traffic but the traffic won’t be a huge problem because the whole of St. Andrews Street will be pedestrianized.
The Grand Arcade will:
- Provide 500 new jobs.
-
Improve the economic status in Cambridge right into the 22nd Century.
- Be accessible to everyone.
- Decrease need of residents to travel elsewhere to shop.
- Provide an attractive destination with several cafes, bras and restaurants.
- John Lewis will still be trading in Cambridge.
- Offer modern shopping facilities.
The Grand Arcade’s central location guarantees easy access by foot, bus and bike. There will be additional bike parking spaces. Its central location will push shared trips, e.g. to see other shops around the city. The proposals also say that the Lion Yard car park will be knocked down and rebuilt according to modern standards and will still keep the same amount of parking spaces. It will increase number of entrances to the car park and it will have electronic devices telling motorists the availability of spaces left. This will reduce the traffic and congestion in Downing Street and Pembroke Street immensely. When it is finished, the Grand Arcade will be a major city attraction. (See Pic.5, 6 and 7).
The Grand Arcade will be in the central business area/district of Cambridge (See Map. 2 on next page) and it will be the main attraction of shopping services available in Cambridge. This new scheme will benefit Robert Sayle in a big way.
The department store will:
- Be double the size of the present store.
- Offer a wider range of goods and services.
- Provide better environment for shoppers.
- It will have a new restaurant plus a coffee shop.
- Continue to uphold free delivery service.
- Recruit up to 250 new staff members, which means more job opportunities.
Robert Sayle will continue to trade through the construction and there won’t be much disruption as the construction work will be in phases. Professor Sir Colin Stansfield Smith CBE designed the new department store.
Cambridge is a vastly attractive area for shoppers and tourists. They are attracted by the quality of the centre environment and shopping in a city with history behind it. However, despite all this, the number of shops in the main area is small and there is demand from retail companies for more modern shopping facilities.
By extending the main shopping area in Cambridge, the scheme will also help to rectify the pedestrian congestion. The wider range of shops available for locals will decrease out of town shopping.
There was an article published (See Article. 1) in the Cambridge Weekly News with headline “City slips in top of the shops league.”
This is an article explaining about how Cambridge is slipping in the top of the shops league. The article goes on to say, “If the drift continues, Cambridge slip out of the league all together by next year because it does not have the shops deemed to be attractive to shoppers.” This is where the Grand Arcade comes in because with that, “Cambridge would be able to climb back up the league table.” It is said, “When the Grand Arcade has been built we will have arguably one of the biggest shopping centres in the country. It will have been completely revamped from what it is not and we can then hope to be in top 10, rivalling cities like Manchester for shopping.” As you can see the Grand Arcade will reap huge benefits for Cambridge in terms of environment, local people and the economy. I think that the proposed schemes are sustainable into the future as the Grand Arcade is quite a long-term project. It will also attract investment of big retail companies into the city while improving an area that includes some less appealing parts of the historic centre. The only way I don’t think the Grand Arcade will benefit local people is because according to the census data, most unemployment is in the north (See Map. 3 on next page) of Cambridge and so the Grand Arcade is not in the north. So maybe the council ought to think about developing some shopping facilities around the north side of Cambridge, as public transport is not very good in that area as well.
I think that the local people have been consulted well, there have been articles about it, leaflets, surveys done and loads on the Internet about it. The council does consult people regularly regarding the Grand Arcade and unless they keep doing this there is likely to be conflict. They might not be happy about the disruption or tearing buildings down, etc. These are they types of conflicts that are likely to occur.
Methodology
I will be putting the hypothesis to the test by doing the following:
- I will collect photos and press cuttings from newspapers about shopping in Cambridge.
- I will plan and carry out a survey to find out reigning opinions/statements from the Cambridge people about shopping in Cambridge. (See Sample. 1 on next page).
- After carrying out the survey, I will put my results into several results tables and plot them all on separate graphs.
- I will analyse my results.
- I will annotate a copy of my survey plus all photos and maps collected
- I will then come to write a conclusion stating whether I agree or disagree with the Hypothesis.
- I will then write an evaluation. I will write about the skills I acquired, what I learnt and got out of this study and how I could improve if given a second chance.
Our survey was designed to help us find out the opinions of the locals and by doing so knowing whether Cambridge needs more shopping facilities or not. We sent out to answer questions like what kinds of goods people shop for to help us decide what kinds of shops are needed. We needed answers to things like how people got into town, how long it took and how they travelled to help us see whether Cambridge’s transport is good or whether it is easy to move around in Cambridge. We decided that we needed data on how people rate Cambridge as a place to shop in terms of comparison shopping, quality of department stores, whether it is a clean environment, facilities for disabled, ease of moving around the town centre and the range of specialist shops. We thought that this would help us with seeing exactly what in Cambridge needs improvement and the type of things that have an impact on people shopping in Cambridge and not shopping elsewhere. For example if it is not easy to get around the city centre then people are hardly going to want to shop in Cambridge, they’ll find other places instead and as a result the shopper’s in Cambridge will reduce.
We made sure that we asked both genders and we had a wide range of ages, going from 14-60. But we split them up into groups, going from 14-25, 26-40, 41-60 and 60+. This is so that we could get a wide range of information from a large age group and both genders and by doing so we could see what representatives from both genders and age groups think about shopping in Cambridge. We asked them how often they shop in the city centre to focus on their activity and what they do daily and to see whether Cambridge needs new shopping facilities.
My main sources of data are as follows: I arranged interviews with Planners of future developments (See Matthew Glass as well) to find out about the plans for the proposed Grafton Centre Phase 3 and the future Coral Park development. We took photos of the city centre and the Grafton centre and annotated them to show the positive/negative features of the shopping environment in Cambridge. I used 1991 census data to draw up a choropleth map to show the unemployment status in Cambridge.
Conclusion
Looking at the graphs, it is quite clear that the Grand Arcade is going to benefit just about everybody. Mainly, what I found out is that Cambridge is very popular indeed for shopping mainly because of the history and heritage it possesses. There are a few minor things that let the city down. E.g. Environment, Ease of moving around the centre, etc. These factors play a huge role in the world of shopping. If they’re not satisfactory then people are going to find elsewhere to shop. I also found out that Cambridge lacks in quality and number of shops. I think that shopping in terms of number of shops and quality is one of the most important things. Cambridge has very few shops right now. But because of the Grand Arcade, the problem can be resolved. The Grand Arcade is going to have more than 50 new shops and in the produce 500 new job opportunities. This will in effect ease traffic, congestion and pollution by reducing the number of cars and by doing so; it will be solving the environmental problem in Cambridge. Also, by expanding the main shopping area in the city centre, the scheme will ease pedestrian congestion, as there will be a wider range of shops for local people to visit. In the Grand Arcade, there will be an anticipated total of 50+ shops and all of very high quality. The increased variety of shops in Cambridge will reduce all needs to travel out of the city for shopping purposes. The most interesting thing we discovered was that most people prefer covered shopping. We would have thought people like open shopping but they don’t according to the results. The Grand Arcade will be a covered shopping area so people will be shopping in a covered environment.
The proposed schemes for the Grand Arcade are sustainable into the future as it is quite a long-term project. It will also provide investment in local transport, which will improve the accessibility to and around the city centre. It will attract more investment and trade from big retail companies and this will contribute to the economic growth/prosperity of Cambridge into the next century.
Cambridge’s current position as a sub regional centre is very low but as said in article.1, Cambridge has a chance to climb back up the table. When the Grand Arcade has been built, Cambridge’s overall position will go up tremendously. The city will be in the top ten for shopping and will be rivalling cities like Manchester and London as a result of the proposed scheme.
Before I did this study I thought that Cambridge was quite good in shopping despite lacking a bit but in general I thought it was ok. Now after doing the study and looking at shopping in a whole new dimension, I have realised that what Cambridge has now is not enough. To cater for 21st century needs, Cambridge needs new shops, better quality shops and a better shopping environment. That is why the council has proposed this scheme for the Grand Arcade so that Cambridge can cater for 21st century needs and even for 22nd Century needs for that matter. Shops need to get better in quality in size, in range of products, and in several different areas that affect the way a person shops. Personally I think the shopping in Cambridge city centre boasts quality, pleasantness and superiority. But there is something missing. We need new shopping facilities. Every other city is putting up big shopping complexes and Cambridge always seems to be behind. This is where the Grand Arcade comes in. When completed, the Grand Arcade will be one of the biggest and best shopping complexes in the country. It will give Cambridge the boost it needs in terms of the regional economy and environment. It will give Cambridge the new shops it need. The Grand Arcade will also be accessible to all and it will give Cambridge new and improved shop mobility.
After doing this study and realising all this, I have decided that I agree with the hypothesis:
“In order to survive as the main sub regional shopping centre, Cambridge needs new and better shopping facilities.”
The reason for this is because Cambridge simply doesn’t have what it takes now to carry the city through the 21st century. It needs to improve in so many areas/factors that affect shopping. Cambridge lacks in number of shops and other cities don’t. Cambridge lacks in quality and other cities don’t. The shopping facilities we have now are not sustainable into the 21st century. I think that out of all the proposed schemes, the Grand Arcade is the one with the most potential to give Cambridge the shopping facilities it needs to survive in the 21st Century. I believe that the Grand Arcade will be the development that solves all of Cambridge’s problems and as said in Article 1., “When the Grand Arcade is built, we will have arguably one of the biggest shopping centres in the country.”
Evaluation
By doing this study I’ve learned about shopping, not just in Cambridge, but shopping in general. It has helped me to look and approach shopping in a much more professional manner than before. I’ve learned to approach coursework in a professional way by working with it in phases. If there’s anything that I’ve learnt about this coursework, it’s definitely planning. Without planning there is no sense of order and without order I can’t really do much. I have improved my geographical and key skills hugely. They are as follows:
- Annotating photos in better detail.
- How to relate what I’m saying back to a hypothesis
- I’ve learnt to hold formal surveys and interviews, process and analyse the data myself.
- I’ve learnt how to research in more depth.
- Present work in a formal manner and in some kind of formal structure.
- I’ve learnt how to compare results and see how they relate to a hypothesis
- Reflect critically on a topic.
- Present my data clearly and accurately so it is easy to read.
- Read and understand graphs, tables and charts and interpret them.
- Analyse images at a complex level.
As you can see, I have acquired a lot of skills both geographical and key skills out of this study.
I was very proud of the way that I conducted myself when I came to do this coursework. I didn’t waste any time and I managed my time well. Time management and discipline is the key to success in any piece of work, which I’m most proud of in this study. If I started it again, I think I’d be getting someone who knows a lot about the topic to be checking what I’ve done weekly or even every few days so I know how I’m doing and what I need to do to improve. What I tend to do with long pieces of coursework is to go through it and not get anyone to check it until the last minute when it’s too late. So this is the area that I’d improve in. Otherwise I’m very pleased with the whole study and would definitely do it again if given chance.
