Upon completion of the historical analysis, the research project will then move on to the primary research phase. As has previously been noted, the relevance of this project‟s findings to the wider population are limited and, as such, there is no need to select a case study location based upon whether it serves as an effective proxy for the wider population. Instead, given the specific research focus, it is pertinent to select a location that accords closely to the traditional spatial distribution of retail, as it is these locations, that are most threatened from the changing dynamics of retail today. Much of our understanding of how retail spaces develop in relation to one another and the wider consumer population is grounded in spatially defined models such as Central Place Theory or Reilly‟s Law of Retail Gravitation. Central to most of these models is the concept of the retail hierarchy, which establishes a pattern of
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interlinked retail centres, which have a „diminishing‟ retail provision, as one travels away from the central core. Given this, it is advisable that any research case study area should have at its heart a retail centre of the highest order and should then be approximately lined up with and incorporate all surrounding areas that fall into the catchment of this core centre. In addition to this, it would also be beneficial for the case study area to have a variety of different retail centre types, as retail planning policies are principally built around these. This would ideally include a wide array of both hierarchically (e.g. town, district and local centres) and non-hierarchically (e.g. retail parks, outlet malls) defined centres.
3.5.1 Selecting a Suitable Research Area
Utilising the Venuescore UK Shopping Venue Rankings produced by Javelin Group for 2014/15, 22 major city-centre retail destinations can be identified in the United Kingdom (Javelin Group, 2015). Removing those retail centres located in either Scotland or Northern Ireland (which have their own unique planning systems) and removing those located in London (which as a global city would provide a unique set of data) leaves 16 potential locations. This can be further trimmed to five, by removing all but the remaining highest ranked destinations (Manchester, Leeds, Birmingham, Liverpool and Brighton). As all of these destinations have been classified by Venuescore as being approximate to one another in terms of market position (upper middle), fashion position (fashion forward) and age position (mid), it can be determined that any of them would be a suitable candidate to be selected as the centre of a case study area.
In order to select the most appropriate research area, it is therefore necessary to consider other factors. According to the Local Data Company, the North West of England has been among the worst affected regions by the shift in retailer and consumer behaviours over the last several years, with the region experiencing a net loss of 195 stores operated by multiple retailers in 2014 and 2015 (LDC, 2016). In addition to this, the North West also had the highest vacancy level in the country in the first half of 2014, both in terms of town centres (19.3% against a national average of 13.4%) and retail parks (11.2% against a national average of 8.1%) (LDC, 2014b). Given this, a decision was taken to further narrow the pool of potential candidates
Mark Davies - October 2019 63 down to just Liverpool and Manchester, as these are both located in the North West of England.
At this stage, it was determined that the final decision would need to be made with regard to considerations that went beyond statistical data. Of particular note here was the pipeline of ongoing and proposed retail developments which were occurring in the wider Liverpool region, which had only relatively recently seen the opening of Liverpool ONE: a 42-acre, £1bn, retail-led, mixed use redevelopment of the city centre that added over 170,000 sq metres of retail and leisure floor space (Littlefield, 2009). Notable ongoing or proposed retail developments in the wider Liverpool region included the development of the new Liverpool Shopping Park, which when completed would provide 65,000 sq metres of retail and leisure space (The Derwent Group, 2016); the redevelopment of the New Mersey Shopping Park; the redevelopment of the Junction 9 Retail Park; an expansion to the Cheshire Oaks Designer Outlet Village; the proposed redevelopment of Kirkby town centre; and the Northgate Scheme in Chester.
Another consideration that lent support to the Liverpool city-region being an appropriate location for this research project was the considerable variance in performance levels between its best and worst performing retail centres. For example, the wider Liverpool region has examples of very strong performance in some centres, including Liverpool ONE (ranked 11th nationally among shopping centres), Cheshire Oaks (ranked 1st nationally among outlet malls) and the New Mersey Retail Park (ranked 9th nationally among retail parks) (Javelin Group, 2015). Conversely, several locations within the wider Liverpool region have been frequently identified and highlighted in the media as suffering from particularly acute levels of decline including Birkenhead, Bootle, Ellesmere Port, Runcorn, Skelmersdale and Southport (Barrett, 2014; Butler, 2014; McDonough, 2013; Murphy and Miller, 2016; Norbury, 2014). The experience of Liverpool would seem to chime with wider sectoral evidence, which suggests that in today‟s technologically inclined retail sector, the strongest locations are getting stronger, while the weakest locations are getting weaker. For this reason, along with the other factors cited above, Liverpool was ultimately selected as the preferred research location for this research project.
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3.5.2 Establishing Research Area Boundaries
In establishing the outer boundaries for the research area, the most obvious solution would be to use the boundaries of a pre-existing geographical subdivision, such as Merseyside or the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority. However, demarcating the edge of the research area in this way would not be appropriate, as it is widely acknowledged that the influence of major urban centres often extends far beyond such boundaries (Centre for Cities, 2010). In the case of Liverpool, a 2011 report authored by The RT Hon. Lord Michael Heseltine and Sir Terry Leahy, suggested that the zone of economic influence of Liverpool could be seen to extend considerably further than the boundaries established by the Liverpool City Region:
“At its core, the Merseyside conurbation, and what is now called Liverpool City Region, has a population of around 1.5 million, centred on the City of Liverpool. However... the economic region is bigger, including areas of population dispersal such as Skelmersdale and Winsford, and important Merseyside industrial towns such as Ellesmere Port” (Heseltine and Leahy, 2011, p19)
In effect, what this report suggested was that while local governance and the provision of public services are delineated by set boundaries, economic activity is not constrained in such terms, meaning that the zone of economic influence of a large city such as Liverpool can extend far beyond statutory boundaries. Heseltine and Leahy (2011) contend that in order to determine the true extent of the economic influence of Liverpool, it is necessary to consider a wide variety of factors:
“The extent of the region can be observed through such things as the catchment areas of the city centre shops, and of specialist health and education facilities, the circulation area of the regional daily newspapers and location of listeners to local radio stations, the spread of the Merseytravel train network and travel to work flows, the spread of housing markets, and the areas served by sports, entertainment and cultural facilities. These variously delineate an urban region centred on Liverpool that spreads from Wrexham and Flintshire to Chester,
Mark Davies - October 2019 65 Warrington, West Lancashire and across to Southport” (Heseltine and Leahy, 2011, p20)
Given this assertion and in consideration of the various factors relevant to this research project, it has been determined that it is appropriate to adopt a case study area that is centred on Liverpool and which extends to cover the local authorities of Wirral, Sefton, Knowsley, St. Helens, Halton, Warrington, Cheshire West and Chester, and West Lancashire. This factors in considerations not only relating to the economic influence outlined above, but also road4 , rail5 and bus6 links, as well as historic ties7. The decision to use local authority boundaries as the final demarcation point has been taken because this research is concerned with planning matters and local planning authorities in England operate at an authority-wide level. In reality, the true extent of the zone of influence for Liverpool‟s retail core is likely to be either slightly closer or further away than the boundaries of the peripheral local authorities; however, using such boundaries would not be appropriate given the planning focus of this research project.