Town centres across the country (and certainly in my region of Merseyside) have been decimated, not only by a shift in shopping patterns, but also by the pandemic. In my own local town centre, I would guess that 1 in 3 shops are now vacant.
Synonymously, the decline of our town-centres is further blighted by the number of homeless people using the area for shelter and as a means of income. Numbers of homeless people have sadly increased throughout the pandemic.
This is a problem in its own right but also has a negative impact on the ‘appeal’ of town centre shopping.
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