Terry Nunn
- Location: London Road, Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 4,316
Went over to Ashford on Friday to the wonderful world of County Square. It has just been extended. My wife was in seventh heaven when we walked into Debenthingies, a huge store over two floors. This to my mind is certainly competition to what I call McCarthur Park.
On the way back we went into Folkestone to the new shop that replaces M&S. Oh that we had something similar here.
On arrival at Dover we were confronted with Charlton Centre. Need I say more?
OK so we will have DTIZ. But who want's a couple of shops, an hotel and a supermarket on a trunk road that gets clogged up from time to time?
The whole rot started post war when the Engineering Works were allowed to expand in the town centre. I once saw a sign in the back of a car. "Town Planners do it with their eyes closed" How true. I feel like picking Dover up and saying "Have some bloody sense"
4291
Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?
Guest 640- Registered: 21 Apr 2007
- Posts: 7,819
Good posting Terry. It says what a lot of us are feeling. I know from the shopping prerequisites of the 'wimmin in my loife' that there just arent the facilities to keep them going here in Dover. They are running on empty shoppingwise. They need more. And as its women who keep the shops of the nation in profit they should know!
I think with regard to DTIZ and ASDA, most of us at this point are desperate to get it under the guise that "almost anything is better than what we have now" Im quoting Howard from memory there and I guess that about sums it up.
howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
i realise that people want more than is on offfer, but do they want another 50 years of dereliction?
pauls photos summed it up.
rattled a few cages, so be it.
Good on all of you.....it's not even just the shops - wimmin like me who loathe "shopping" would still like some interesting shops and places to go, and a quick and easy way of shopping for a pair of shoes to replace the old ones without making a sodding day of it!! Shops that sell paints and pencils (we have a couple but they are hardly competetive although I have to say I like the one in Castle street for a browse), clay and enamels, sheet music and guitar and banjo strings - I go to Deal for my musical stuff but it wuld be grand to just pop into Dover!!!! Something a bit different.....
Terry Nunn- Location: London Road, Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 4,316
The problem is of course that it's a Catch 22 situation. We won't get the decent range of shops here because we don't have the shoppers, they go elsewhere. We don't have the shoppers because we don't have decent shops. OK, so we might get ASDA here but that won't solve any problem, it will just create others. I'm sure that an immedaite effect will be the closure of Somerfield and a great number of smaller shops.
I'm afraid it's a problem to which there in no easy answer. Perhaps "Son of TCM" can sort it out.
4291
Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?
No easy answer - it is a challenge certainly, but it's not made any easier by the outrageous lack of promotion and support for Dover from people whose job it is to promote and support Dover!!! I realise it is a big job and I recognise the huge amount of work done by a small but dedicated group of people (often volunteers, but I'll let that lie...) but surely there's more that can be done.......?
howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
don't forget that a lot of our catchment area is populated by fish.
not much call for shoes, clothing etc from them.
ashford has a great geographical position, road and rail links and it's population is growing daily.
not long before it will be classed as a city.
Guest 653- Registered: 13 Mar 2008
- Posts: 10,540
There are many reasons why people don't shop in Dover; I do think that many people go elsewhere because they think they can't get anything here - without even checking, on many occasions.
Yes, the choice is limited, but we do have ladies clothes and gents too, a few years ago we had a plethora of shoe shops, now we have just two.
We have De Bradelei, where you can buy things for the home as well as for yourself, we have haberdashery shops, all manner of food and drink outlets - cafes, restaurants, pubs etc.
School uniforms etc. green-grocers, phone shops, estate agents, gift shops; great gift shops too - look at Curiosity of Dover in Cannon Street, they have some great designer jewellery and hand-made hand-bags, designer sun-glasses, as well as swarovski crystal and moorcroft pottery.
Yankee Gifts in Priory Street have just started a 25% discount sale - 25%, now that's worth having.
I am not complacent at all as we do need more shops and greater variety too.
We also need the buildings smartened up - they can do it in other Towns, we must do it here.
Every Town has the odd closed shop, but between them closing and someone else taking it over, it must not be allowed to be left in the state that Party Planners and the old Zoom/ Kodak shop were left in.
ASDA won't be the only shop in the DTIZ area, they do bring shops in - look at those around ASDA in Folkestone, brightens up the whole area.
Roger
Howard, we had a seal here for a while, and a dolphin that visited us from Folkestone - I used to know a barrow boy who could have sold them shoes if he'd a mind to do it.........
