Bath Street is the one shopping street in the town centre that has not yet been repaved, although the flower beds at one end, and the war memorial at the other have seen improvements.
At the further end of the street shops like Marie and Masons have many followers, but some of the businesses in the middle of the street do not seem to have fared so well.
The florist has closed, and last week, to add insult to injury, somebody went on the rampage and broke their shop window, and those of some other Bath Street shops.
Next door, was once a well known letting agency, which has not been re-let. Now, there is a planning application to create more accommodation at the rear of this shop and above. Flats do work and bring in money.
But it is to be hoped, once the nearby precinct work has been completed, that increased customer footfall will benefit Bath Street.
Its hard for this town to attract retailers and now our town has shop windows being smashed . every month another shop shuts I spoke to the owners of many shops and they said if business does not increase within a few weeks they will be shut too . We cant afford to keep letting shops go out of business it will ruin house prices as employment will fall i urge you to get into these shops and start spending and stop spending in other overpriced towns and cities .
I would also like to add the new precinct will not benefit Bath street it will benefit the precinct the same as the orchard centre in Didcot that has opened and all other shops outside and round it are closing .
falling house prices wouldn’t be the worst possible thing that could happen to abingdon.
Feel sorry about the Florists. They presented a nice tradional frontage and very attractive window displays. Let us hope that it does not become another Bookmakers – a growth industry in the UK according to the TV a couple of nights ago. Bath Street has some nice buildings and has great potential if it could attract the right businesses.
(Falling house prices could be an absolute disaster for those of us who have moved here recently!!)
is this our only answer to improve Abingdon town centre build more Flats has the council seen the traffic problem in Abingdon because of the amount of houses built in the last 5 years . I would not be surprised to see a Tesco metro in the town precinct and then it will be game over for somerfields and co op . That will be a further two shops shut as a result of the supermarket giant .
I see that the Bath Street Bistro has also recently closed. Real shame, went there a few times and the food was really good. Hope Maria and Louise have a new venture to go onto.
Bath Street has been the black sheep of abingdon shopping for years, unfortunately its not a high footfall area, the same as stert street isn’t really, and Mr G the coop in the precinct is due to close during the second stage of the redevelopment anyway and the one on west st helen street won’t close because of the post office. from the plans for the redevelopment they are planning to open up bath street more, they are removing the 2 small kiosks.
As I work in Bath Street I hope more shops open up soon, even the lucky 777’s are up for sale.
Good news the Nags Head will be open soon, Sept this year I hear, missed going there this summer
Adding to Graham’s comment above, it will be important that when the proposals for Phase 2 of the Charter are published we check carefully to see what the implications are for Bath Street: for example if the ex-Woolworths/Poundland unit has frontages/exits on to Bath Street that would liven it up considerably. Similarly the way Broad Street leads in to Bath Street is important.
Another thought – I wonder if Bath Street retailers have any form of collective voice? They might have more success in influencing Council decisions/improving the overall attractiveness of the street if they did.
@rudi – completely agree. If sanity is to return to the housing market we need to see a slow but steady drop in prices for many years to come.
@Mr G – I disagree. Having more people living in the town centre can only help local trade and creates less additional traffic than building in the suburbs or on greenfield sites.
@Kat P I have to disagree with you I do not see how you think adding more properties to the town centre will decrease traffic they still have leave and return . Also it only helps local trade if local people shop in Abingdon and i can tell yoi from my own experience as a shop owner they dont . I have spoke to many other shop owners they all say we are losing to many people through the doors to Didcot and Oxford and we will not get big high street names in the precinct when its finished . The precinct may be more busy when its finished but the shops around it will be finished like in Didcot like Mr Annoyed said