Mole Valley Council are going to spend 100 mill on total redevelopment of Leatherhead town centre over the next 25 years. Hope I’ll still be around to see it.

Although some more local independents are going out of business apparently, the good news is Cycleworks are staying put, according to Dave Farmer.

Breathe and relax. 8)

Well that’s good news for Leatherhead and its well overdue, its so run down its hard to believe it’s in Surrey 😉

Croydon is in Surrey, the shame of the county. Good they are spending all that money, hope some of it’s on flood defence.

Leatherhead ain’t that bad but it’s no Dorking….

They did quite a lot to it in the late 90s I think? Before I moved to the area but think I remember seeing stuff being done.

@jools, perhaps there should be an online petition to have Croydon removed from Surrey ? (only joking I have relatives living there)

Leatherhead ain’t that bad but it’s no Dorking….

Dorking would be a lot nicer if you cut down the amount of traffic on the high street by about 70%.

How you gonna do that GeeTee? The only way I can think of is a Hindhead style tunnel, preferably straight under the town.
There’s no way to build a bypass without seriously damaging the surrounding hills, so the traffic will stay as bad, if not get worse.

Weird place Leatherhead at times. Seems to be in the sort of high St downward spiral of many towns but is packed with office workers at lunchtime. There now.

I wonder what they will spend £4M a year on?

seems slightly weird to me, the ‘popular opinion’ appears to suggest that town centres got ‘into difficulty’ thanks to
– internet
– parking charges
– high business rates
Not sure who is responsible for the internet(but I see it continuing to grow and have further impact on shopping behaviour) but on the other two ……

I also think we’re now playing ‘nice place shuffle’ – in that there are more ‘facilities’ than money and if you tart up A then B will pay the price…

edit.
http://core.kmi.open.ac.uk/download/pdf/356750.pdf
p17 1st para (I used to live near Reading, bits go up, bits go down…)

In order for Leatherhead town to survive (or look forward), they need to have more than just restaurants and hair salons.

I wonder what they will spend £4M a year on?

incompetence probably

Dorking would be a lot nicer if you cut down the amount of traffic on the high street by about 70%.

Catch 22: Dorking only has the shops, cafes etc because it has the traffic running through it where as Leatherhead is pedestrianised and seems dead when ive visited particularly in the evenings.

Personally I’ll take the hassle of extra traffic through Dorking if it keeps the broad selection of shops including lots of independents, cafes and restaurants plus helps keep Dorking halls and the leisure centre going…be a far worse place without these

I rode for one day in Morzine this summer with the surry hills riders and Leon ,was it anyone on this thread.
Apologies for the detour.

Croydon is in Surrey

No it’s not. It was, but it’s not now. Purley is still Surrey.

Good news for Leatherhead, I only ever ride through it, but it looks like a bit of a dump!

Dorking would be a lot nicer if you cut down the amount of traffic on the high street by about 70%.

Imagine what it was like pre M25…

I grew up in Leatherhead, and after moving around a fair amount, I came back to That Surrey and have lived in Dorking for the past 12 years or so.

If I remember rightly, Leatherhead is one of the poorest areas in Surrey – a county with a ludicrously high cost of living already.

I remember when the High Street didn’t have the Swan Centre bolted onto it – there were two grocers, a butcher and a bunch of other shops, including Cullens and the awesome hardware shop that’s still (last time I chekce going strong. Sainsburys’ moved in and pretty much killed the small local traders off within about five years. The High Street was pedestrianised at some point – I don’t remember when, but after the damage had been done. Running cars up and down it, as some people advocate, wouldn’t fix the problem.

I’m not against supermarkets, but the sheer lack of competition meant that Sainsburys has pretty much dominated the town centre for the last couple of decades. I’ve moved around enough to see local traders everywhere find it difficult to compete with chains. That might be changing – let’s hope so. I’ve noticed in Dorking that three supermarkets (Sainos, Waitrose and Lidl) seems to strike a balance – and none of them get too ginormous in the process.

One other thing: local shops (for local people!) do, at least, keep the dosh local, rather than sending it off to a head office or tax haven somewhere else. Thinking of three top bike shops near me – Cycleworks, Head for the Hills and Nirvana – all the people owning them are local, and all the people running them (if they’re not run by the proprietor – Walk into Nirvana or HFTH and you’ll probably be speaking to the shop owner) live locally too. If I buy something from Head for the Hills, there’s a better chance the profit from it will be spent with a local business than if I were to buy it in Halfords. Yes, this is localism, but it’s always worth understanding the fringe benefits of buying local – the money comes back one way or another. A bit like if you buy from a company that has a creative tax residency scheme – you’ll never see the benefit of the money you spent on a skinny moccahchocofrappumochacino coming back in the form of facilities or services that are paid for with money from taxes.

Imagine what it was like pre M25…

<uncle albert> during the war <uncle albert>

there were comparatively no cars. The town centre used to be a lot more busy, itell you what the problem is, Harringtons Bakery closed and all the cakes went – that’s when everyone else buggered off!

bent udder, if you buy it from Nirvana, the money will be going straight in to the pie shop across the road.. 🙂 😛

edit to add, and from HFTH – straight to Corbetts!

Nuke, the high street in Leatherhead was dead before they pedestrianised it. I think there’s a lot more to it than that. It’s pretty much impossible to park on the High Street, South or West Street (OK, there are speaces on South Street, but not enough to be solely responsible for the income of local shops) for much of the week. Parking is, from memory, more expensive than the Swan Centre in Leatherhead, too. I think Dorking’s relative success is down to a critical mass of small shops, as much as anything else.

Sui, I’ve not been in Nirvana for a while. Do they accept pies as currency now?
Happy to support Cobbetts through secondary investment. Actually, happy to support the local pie and beer making and selling industry generally, now I think about it…

bent udder, if you buy it from Nirvana, the money will be going straight in to the pie shop across the road.

@Sui top post ! Also Leatherhead could follow most towns these days and fill the centre with estate agents 🙁

@bent udder – it indeed a travesty we have have the demise of the small shops. Co-incidently I am now living opposite a housing trust who insist on small independent shops and it’s wonderful, butcher, fishmonger, grocer, shore repairer, covenience store, 3 restaurants … Definitely support your LBS (I use Nirvana) for exactly the reasons you state

Croydon’s status…

http://www.croydonadvertiser.co.uk/Croydon-London-Croydon-Surrey/story-15224175-detail/story.html

However getting back to Leatherhead it could be a lovely spot with a brush up, it’s certainly handy for London and the Motorways shame it’s a bit souless. I think the major issue with Leatherhead is, too poor to paint to proud to whitewash and the housing stock is a bit limited for most people.

Sui, I’ve not been in Nirvana for a while. Do they accept pies as currency now?

Yes, but they have to be of Yorkshire provenance…

Also Leatherhead could follow most towns these days and fill the centre with estate agents

Leddrede is too down market for that. We’ve gone for the charity shop option.