High Streets Recovery Tracker – The NEN

Centre for Cities has published the latest update to its High Streets Recovery Tracker, covering September 2021. We have data for the 63 largest cities and towns in the UK.

The tracker can be found here.

Here are some embargoed topline trends from this month’s update:

Changes in footfall in September

Overall footfall continued to rise in the centres of the 63 largest cities and towns in the UK in September, the average rise was 8 percentage points.
The biggest increases in footfall were seen in Sheffield, Nottingham and Chatham.
However, ten large city and town centres recorded falls in footfall. The three places recording the largest drops in footfall were seaside resorts: Blackpool, Bournemouth and Southend.
Overall weekday footfall – an indicator of workers back in the office – rose from 60% of pre-pandemic levels at the end of August to 67% by the end of September – a 7 percentage point increase.

Cities with the largest increase in footfall in September
Rank	City	Change in footfall (percentage point)	Overall footfall level as of the last week of September (percentage of pre-pandemic average)
1	Sheffield	33	89
2	Nottingham	32	88
3	Chatham	26	101
4	Huddersfield	20	86
5	Bristol	20	81

Cities with the decrease in footfall in September
Rank	City	Change in footfall (percentage point)	Overall footfall level as of the last week of September (percentage of pre-pandemic average)
1	Blackpool	-37	123
2	Bournemouth	-29	94
3	Southend	-26	97
4	Reading	-23	72
5	Edinburgh	-14	80

Footfall as of the end of September

Overall, footfall had returned to pre-pandemic levels in six of the 63 large cities and town centres studied by the end of September: Blackpool, Swansea, Burnley, Chatham, Sunderland and Dundee.
Overall footfall remains lowest in London, at 49% of pre-pandemic levels it is now the only large city or town in the country where city centre footfall is not yet at half of pre-Covid levels. It’s weekday footfall – an indicator of workers back in the office – also remains the lowest in the UK, at 44% of pre-pandemic levels.
On average, weekday footfall at the end of September was 67% of pre-pandemic levels, with two places – Burnley and Chatham – back to pre-pandemic weekday footfall levels.

Cities with the highest overall footfall as of the end of September
Rank	City	Overall footfall level as of the last week of September (percentage of pre-pandemic average)
1	Blackpool	123
2	Swansea	104
3	Burnley	104
4	Chatham	101
5	Sunderland	100

Cities with the lowest overall footfall as of the end of September
Rank	City	Overall footfall level as of the last week of September (percentage of pre-pandemic average)
1	London	49
2	Milton Keynes	66
3	Oxford	67
4	Luton	68
5	Slough	69

Visitor footfall to city and town centres across the UK drops in June after initial surge– with tourist hubs worse hit
Weekend visitors to Blackpool and Bournemouth almost halve in June
Big city centres continue to struggle with London seeing the weakest recovery of all centres

New data from Centre for Cities’ High Streets Recovery Tracker shows that the recovery of high streets stuttered in June as footfall fell back across the UK – raising concerns about the UK economy’s bounce-back from Covid restrictions.

Seaside and tourist destinations saw the sharpest drops in visitor numbers between the end of May and end of June, with visitors to central Blackpool and Bournemouth falling by by almost half.

Meanwhile, weekend visitors to other tourist destinations such as Brighton, York and Edinburgh also fell steeply.

Overall weekly footfall numbers fell by the end of June in 62 of the 63 city and town centres studied. On average, overall footfall in large city and town centres fell by seven percentage points.

City or large town(selected seaside and tourist destinations)	Weekend footfall Fall in footfall from last weekend of May to last weekend of June (percentage point)	Weekly footfallOverall fall in footfall from end of May to end of June (percentage point)
Blackpool	-45	-18
Bournemouth	-45	-15
Brighton	-39	-16
Southend	-36	-12
York	-28	-14
Portsmouth	-25	-12
Oxford	-23	-10

Pubs, bars and restaurants are also likely to have taken an economic hit as night-time visitors to city and town centres fell by six percentage points between the last weekend of May and last weekend of June.

Despite the fall, small and medium city and town centres continue to have seen the strongest recovery overall since restrictions were lifted, while bigger cities continue to struggle.

Southend, Blackpool and Basildon have come back strongest, with footfall being more than 70 per cent of February 2020 levels but London and other large city centres lag a long way behind – footfall in the centre of the capital was at just under a third of February 2020 levels.

Rank	City or large town	Overall footfall recovery in last week of June (February 2020 = 100)
Top 10
1	Southend	81
2	Blackpool	77
3	Basildon	72
4	Chatham	72
5	Burnley	72
6	Aldershot	71
7	Mansfield	69
8	Gloucester	68
9	Wigan	68
10	Barnsley	67
Bottom 10
54	Milton Keynes	50
55	Liverpool	50
56	Nottingham	49
57	Aberdeen	48
58	Cardiff	46
59	Leeds	46
60	Glasgow	43
61	Manchester	41
62	Birmingham	41
63	London	33

Centre for Cities’ Chief Executive Andrew Carter said: “Much discussion in the lead up to restrictions being lifted was about the amount of pent up demand that lockdowns had created, and the likely splurge in spending as a result. But while there was an initial jump, the data suggests this may have faltered.

“The weather and growing Covid-19 cases may be reasons for this, but with the end of the furlough scheme is in sight, high street businesses and workers will be hoping that the removal of restrictions on 19^th July will help to sustain the high street’s recovery and bring more people back to the centre of our cities.”

Tag: High Streets Recovery Tracker

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