Whatever happened to Union Street?
November 2006
LOST MARKET people did their shopping in street markets or in Archibald Simpson’s New Market of 1842, Aberdeen’s first enclosed shopping mall._
OPINION: by Alex Mitchell
There is widespread concern about the dingy and run-down state of Aberdeen’s principal thoroughfare, all the way from Holburn Junction to the Castlegate and the town end of King Street. This is manifest in the number of empty shops and in the low-rent character of many of such shops as there are. It seems the more odd that this situation has developed during 30 years of oil-boom prosperity, low unemployment and substantially-increased population.
If one thinks back to the Fifties and Sixties Union Street was jam-packed with shoppers along its entire length every Saturday, as was St Nicholas Street/George Street. People dressed up to go ‘doon the toon’, and you met everyone you knew there.
In that sense, Aberdeen really was a village. The street markets in the Green and Castlegate were going concerns. Buses went all the way from Hazlehead to the Sea Beach and back again, via Queen’s Cross, Union Street and the Castlegate, the city’s main bus interchange, where you nipped off one bus and on to another. As a result, far more people had reason to go to the Castlegate than nowadays.
Union Street and St Nicholas Street/George Street were full of interesting, up-market shops: Andrew Collie & Co., the grocer, at the corner of Union Street/Bon Accord Street; Watt & Grant; McMillans under the Trinity Hall; Woolworths backing on to the Green; Falconers, Isaac Benzies, the Equitable, the elegant old Northern Co-op building, the Rubber Shop.
So what happened? Much of the population moved out of down-town tenements and into the peripheral housing estates and new residential developments, ever further from the city. Car ownership became the norm, and car-borne customers prefer shops they can park next to. Supermarkets became superstores and extended their range of merchandise, destroying one specialist retailer after another: butchers, bakers, fishmongers, hardware & electrical stores, shoe shops and now pharmacists, bookshops and record shops.
Superstores and their car parks require huge expanses of land and prefer edge-of-town locations where large sites are cheap and accessible for both customers and delivery lorries. DIY sheds like B&Q, furniture & carpet stores and ‘big box’ retailers like Curry’s similarly prefer them.
Edge-of-town retail complexes, such as Garthdee, may be unhistorical and characterless, but they are convenient, offer easy and free parking, and are generally clean, safe and relatively easy to make secure against break-ins and vandalism.
The obvious way for city centres to fight back was to build down-town malls like the St Nicholas and Bon Accord shopping centres. These offer the kind of accommodation retailers want, and are relatively secure overnight, but tend to abstract custom from the High Street. The case is unproven. Without the down-town malls, the major retailers might have moved out of the city centre altogether.
If, however, the supply of retail premises outruns the demand, the less attractive premises and locations become hard-to-let, the rent obtainable falls, lower-status tenants have to be accepted. Ultimately, premises may become unlettable on any terms. This is what seems to have happened in the west end of Union Street, and not only there.
We are assured that Aberdeen is not ‘overshopped’, but there have been significant increases in the down-town stock of retail premises in recent years, e.g., the Academy in Belmont Street and the Galleria in Bon Accord Street, neither of which were quick to fill up with tenants. The proposed Bon Accord Quarter will substantially increase the capacity of the St Nicholas and Bon Accord malls. And the projected Union Square development at Guild Streetis is to include 60 retail premises.
What else happened? Down-town, the general decline in church attendance after World War 1, combined with the exodus of population from the city centre, rendered many churches redundant. Whatever we may say about the banks, they did put up some very impressive buildings. But, by the 1990s, the Bank of Scotland had abandoned its splendid 1801 premises at the corner of Castle Street/Marischal Street, as did the Clydesdale Bank its 1842 Archibald Simpson premises at the corner of Castle Street/King Street.
What was once the centre of business activity in Aberdeen was so no longer. Aberdeen Journals moved from Broad Street to Lang Stracht. Aberdeen University withdrew from Marischal College and the Student Union (and Bisset’s Academic Bookshop) closed down. Robert Gordon University moved to Garthdee.
There never was a time when things stood still. Old trades and occupations become redundant or move elsewhere, often when displaced by more profitable activities in the Darwinian contest for the use of economic resources, land, labour and capital. Planning applications for ‘change-of-use’ are the normal and desirable state of affairs. But communities and localities go into a decline when old industries are not replaced by new activities, or are replaced by those which are in some way undesirable.
The increased number of vacant premises in Union Street results from the fact that fewer tenants are moving in than are moving out; there is a net exodus of retailers. The sad truth is that Union Street is not nowadays that good an environment in which to try to run a shop.
Old buildings and ground-floor premises are difficult to make secure against break-ins and vandalism. Delivery access for lorries is a problem. Shop staff and customers are harassed by drunks, beggars and drug abusers. Shop doorways, windows and their surroundings are often in a filthy state at the start of each day’s business. It is difficult to find and retain staff who will put up with this for £7.50 per hour. It is not surprising if retailers follow their customers and withdraw to the relatively clean, safe and secure environment of the down-town malls and edge-of-town retail parks.
Aberdeen is a better-run city than most, and always has been. But this situation arises from the non-delivery, or inadequate performance, of council and governmental responsibilities: to maintain law and order, to enforce the law, to deal with anti-social and criminal behaviour, to collect the rubbish and clean the streets and pavements. Putting down the odd tub of begonias is not enough.
As banks, churches and big stores have withdrawn from Union Street, so mega-pubs and bars, nightclubs and fast-food providers have moved in. To an extent, the new arrivals have been welcome, occupying old buildings which would otherwise have remained empty and neglected. Much of this may be regarded as legitimate change-of-use, in response to changing tastes and lifestyles. There is a place for pubs and nightclubs, but perhaps for fewer of r them, and of a different character. These are youth-orientated businesses, and that age-group is shrinking as families move out of the city.
In the meantime, the issue is one of whether the alcohol industry can peacefully co-exist with other economic sectors, retailers, and with the residents of the city centre. All the evidence is that a neighbourhood which loses its settled, long-term resident population is doomed, finished. So if the interests of the local residents and the alcohol industry are in conflict, then the former must take precedence. But it may be that the drugs, alcohol, gambling sectors will be cut down to size only when people get bored with this kind of activity, much as they have in relation to tobacco.
A locality and micro-economy which has long been in decline, such as the Castlegate, can be revived only by rebuilding its resident population and customer-base from the ground up. The buildings at the west end of Union Street (originally Union Place) used to be private houses; people did their shopping in the street markets or in Archibald Simpson’s New Market of 1842, Aberdeen’s first enclosed shopping mall. One of the more positive developments in recent years is the conversion of the upper floors of these old buildings, often long out-of-use, into modern residential accommodation.
As regards the proposed Bon Accord Quarter: this writer is broadly in support of the outline scheme as per the ‘Masterplan’, because it would remove St Nicholas House and bring Marischal College back into an appropriate usage; also because it consolidates the traditional retail heart of Aberdeen as the premier shopping destination in the North-East, the natural location for up-market retailers like Marks & Spencer, John Lewis, Debenham’s and Next, which serve to pull shoppers and visitors into the city centre to the benefit of all.
ALEX MITCHELL was born, brought up and educated in Aberdeen, attending Aberdeen Grammar School 1962–68. Graduated University of Aberdeen 1972, M.A. Economics and from Aberdeen College of Education 1973. Teacher/lecturer of Economics & Business Studies, mainly in England. Returned to Aberdeen in 1995. Much involved with Aberdeen Civic Society and The Ferryhill Heritage Society.
This is an article from the November 2006 edition of Leopard Magazine. To read much more like this every month, see our subscription details.