Coming culture change: the highstreet

 Apparently Amazon and others have non-storefront 'shops' all over the place in our cities: the distribution points for their distribution operations. So when we're considering job losses as yet more high street shop brands go under (Jessops, HMV, Blockbuster, to name some very recently), we should consider that there have been preceding them job 'gains' in other companies for people in warehousing and customer service and this is what capitalism is meant to be about: competition does mean that sometimes there are losses. I

Of course it is horrible to be made redundant, and I'd want to argue that in a social model of capitalism, we should be aiming to make the impact of such 'structural readjustments' as minimal as possible. I know from personal experience how debilitating to self-esteem and mental-emotional good functioning the sustained loss of employment can be.

But what I want to draw attention to now is that there will be implications to having a retail economy increasingly built round online shopping and to-house delivery. It will reshape our High Streets. in fact it is already doing so.

The scything of our shops is happening rapidly, and with no debate about what our high streets should become. If these hearts of community aren't to become low-rent wastelands, we need to create spaces that are public, without being driven by retail.

Actually, I don't think 'low rent' need be a negative. We have experienced a property bubble in this country and so it's likely that, by many standards, rents are too high. A fall in demand for retail space may well mean a fall in rents and sale prices for city centre properties without that in itself creating a down-at-heel feel. it could allow to thrive all sorts of innovative small businesses doing what can't be done by internet retailers (and I don't even know what some of that could be, yet)

It could mean a growth in leisure and meeting place enterprises. it could mean some of our city central spaces being reclaimed for (much needed) housing. it could even be a chance to prevent encroachment on greenbelt by developers both of commercial and domestic properties ...

Shopping: save our streets | Editorial | Comment is free | The Guardian: