A once bustling shopping centre, at one point one of Europe's largest, now stands eerily almost-empty more than 50 years after first opening.
Shopping City in Runcorn, Cheshire, which opened its doors in 1972, has been likened to a ghost town after it lost major retailers like Tesco and The Range. It now sits almost entirely abandoned, which is a far cry from its halcyon days of being officially opened by the late Queen.
It used to have 60 bustling stores, including Littlewoods and Woolworths, both the original anchor shops, but it now plays home to smaller retailers as well as a pop-up shop for start-up businesses.
READ MORE: Exact date UK will be battered by 'frost, wintry showers and deluge' revealed
For more news, click here.
Adam Killen, a local barber, summed up the situation: "A shopping centre with no shops in it." Lisa Mayers, another local resident, pointed out an empty store with adverts for retail space on the windows and said: "We've had everything in here but it's getting worse, emptier. Even the bank has shut down."
Another passer-by noted that the area had failed to keep up with the times, saying it was "behind the times" and the place "stayed in the early 2000s". Nathan Dawson, 30, expressed his concerns about the town's development when asked what he thought of the almost abandoned giant centre.
-
Evil dictators who left their flashy palaces full of mutilated bodies, treasure and porn
He said: "It needs a lot of development. It needs to be brought into the modern times. Everything seems to be developed around Runcorn, but never Runcorn itself."
Despite the grim outlook, some businesses in the Shopping City centre are still managing to keep their doors open. The Coffee House manager Magda Spratek, 35, said: "We are quite lucky because we have regulars, but it's very rare that we see a new face, someone who says 'Let's go to Shopping City and see what's there."
Inside world's largest twin-engine private jet with posh bars and conference centres
Local resident Barbara Roberts, 80, also shared her disappointment, bemoaning: "It's a shame that it has changed; both the new town and the old town. We've got to go over the bridge to buy normal things. All the investment goes over there, to Widnes."
* This article was crafted with the help of an AI tool, which speeds up Daily Star's editorial research. An editor reviewed this content before it was published. You can report any errors to [email protected]
Source: Read Full Article