What is it about?
Vibrant high streets and town centres require successful local economies. But too often questions of 'success' fail to ask the key question: who benefits? This article argues that instead of examining how existing models can be made more resilient, planners and policymakers need to consider transitions to more equitable models of economic development.
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Why is it important?
Town planning in the UK and beyond is stuck in a model of retail-led development for town centres. Such approaches are expensive and often fail to achieve their hoped-for impacts. This article outlines an alternative viewpoint.
Perspectives
This article draws on my research in How to Save Our Town Centres (Policy Press, 2015) and my involvement in policy development and debate from the time of the Portas Review (2011) onwards, as well as my wider knowledge of urban regeneration build up in more than 10 years as editorial director of New Start magazine.
Dr Julian Dobson
Sheffield Hallam University
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Rethinking town centre economies: Beyond the ‘place or people’ binary, Local Economy The Journal of the Local Economy Policy Unit, May 2016, SAGE Publications,
DOI: 10.1177/0269094216640472.
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