It’s a massive move, absolutely transformational, and will have enormous impacts not just for Oxford Street but also for the surrounding areas.
I love big ideas, and I also love big transformational projects with a focus on supporting retail and our inner cities. In terms of scale and impact, few come close globally to this one, so it’s rightfully caught attention and conversation (at least on my news feed anyway).
My personal experience in this area of transformation is from working on four separate retail strip pedestrianisation projects here in Australia, including one project that transitioned a pedestrian retail strip back to vehicle access in regional Victoria.
So, to get to the point nice and quickly. Do I think it will work?
No.
Certainly not in its current proposed format. And that’s for three main reasons.
Reason One – The weather
London is not renowned for its consistent quality weather. In my experience, pedestrianised areas work best when the weather and climate are consistently good, allowing people to shop and move with confidence. The world’s best pedestrianised areas are located in predominantly warm and sunny climates, such as Barcelona or Brisbane.
Alternatively, they also work in areas that are somewhat closed in, such as Melbourne’s famed laneways or Rome’s ‘area pedonale’, which are located throughout the heart of the city.
Oxford Street is neither closed in nor offers much by way of weather protection from London’s rain or sheer cold, with many of the beautiful heritage buildings not providing any external shelter at all.
Furthermore, the sheer square meterage of open space this plan will activate will make creating any form of sheltering prohibitively expensive and difficult to maintain, and will likely require a commercial lease to justify the expense. (Not a completely bad idea, see below).
According to the current designs, there appears to be little consideration given to weather conditions broadly, which I hope will change as the design evolves. Without it, the shopping experience will only improve seasonally, which, when taking plans back to retailers, will likely be met with a rather visceral response. (I’ve been there).
Reason two – Hospitality
Central to pedestrianised areas working is the role hospitality businesses play in activating the space. Places to pause, rest, and people watch are paramount to creating vibrancy. The old adage is always true: people attract people.
Hospitality operators maintain the space, they clean, the prevent loitering, and they are generally responsible for the presentation of key areas within a pedestrianised zone.
Without this present, creates a range of generally social issues that fester in these areas.
Compounding this is that Oxford Street is almost exclusively luxury retail, a very poor activator of pedestrianised areas. As rents continue to rise sharply along the strip (average $1,200 AUD per square foot), fewer and fewer hospitality operators will be able to access space. Therefore, the direction the strip has taken over the last decade, towards fashion and consumer goods, will only continue to accelerate, shutting out businesses that would better appeal to this type of transformation project.
The strategy could overcome this by exploring opportunities for hospitality to activate the central mall areas, creating diversity and activation but again, it doesn’t appear this is currently in the plans.
Reason three – Luxury retailers won’t love this.
Oxford Street is one of the world’s unique shopping precincts. Many retailers along the strip are not there primarily for sales purposes, but rather for brand placement reasons. Almost all stores are loss leaders, with brands justifying the enormous expense by the raw power associated with their brand being prominent on London’s busiest street, where millions of buses, taxis, and cars drive past their signage every day.
By removing that traffic volume, brands will start to reconsider the value they place on these stores, and over time, the rents may become less justifiable.
Will pedestrian footfall replace that traffic? Unlikely, but time will tell.
Wrap up
All in all, I remain a strong believer in these types of transformational projects. Pedestrianising does work, just not in these specific circumstances.
And we do need to start thinking about our cities catering better towards pedestrians. This conversation is also vital to Melbourne, as we continue to work on understanding how our city is changing in response to the new world we are rapidly entering.
In any case, I’ll be watching this one with great interest.
What are your thoughts on this project? Would love to hear.
