Burnham announces £210m investment to revive boarded-up high streets
Manchester mayor launches fund to help bring neglected shops and buildings back into use.
What to know
- Burnham committed £210 million to revive boarded-up shops and neglected buildings on high streets.
- Commenters noted structural barriers: landlords often profit more from vacancy than from renting at lower rates, and large investment companies control many properties with no incentive to reoccupy them.
- The announcement drew mixed reactions on whether spending alone can overcome the economics of property ownership that incentivize vacancy.
The dispute Whether a £210 million fund can meaningfully address high street vacancy when the underlying problem is landlord incentives to leave properties empty rather than rent at lower rates. · positions read across 7 posts and comments
Landlord economics, not lack of funding, is the core barrier to reviving high streets.
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“It's often better for the landlord for it to be vacant than occupied with a lower rent. If they drop the rent then that makes the building worth less which can then breach the mortgage. Plus a lot of high street landlords aren't just a…”
Kogg · Reddit ↗
Politicians get undue credit for simple spending announcements without clear implementation plans.
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“Meanwhile if Rupert Lowe promised to spend £700 trillion making sure every house in Britain has its own Greggs by the end of his first hour in office, people here would be saying "Finally, a politician that gets what people want…"”
NeddieSeagoon619 · Reddit ↗
Andy Burnham Manchester mayor
How it unfolded 1 development · click the chart to see its coverage postscomments
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Burnham announces £210m high street revival fund
Andy Burnham unveiled a £210 million investment to help bring neglected high streets back to life, targeting empty shops and buildings that have been boarded up or left vacant for years.
“We're investing £210 million to help bring neglected high streets back into use.”
— Andy Burnham -
We've all walked past them. The empty shop that's been boarded up for years. The old cinema gathering dust. The building everyone says, "someone should do something about that." Well, that's exactly what I'm doing. We're investing £210 million to help bring neglected high
2 more of the top 3 · 7 posts in this stretch
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A lot of the old cinemas and similar are listed and it's far too complex to do them up to modern standards whilst filling in endless amounts of listed buildings consent and planning permission forms. Local councils interpret listed building rules in such varied ways often on the whims of local conservation officers and so no developers want to…
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It’s often better for the landlord for it to be vacant than occupied with a lower rent. If they drop the rent then that makes the building worth less which can then breach the mortgage. Plus a lot of high street landlords aren’t just a person, they’re big investment companies with hundreds, if not thousands of properties.
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What people are saying 4 voices from 1 site · best of 7 · verbatim
- Sep 26
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Or we make the problem worse, as a bunch of shops are forced to close during the normal day and then stay open until 2200, paying staff to stand around doing nothing as more people switch to online shopping. What makes you think they get paid for the hours inbetween?
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Yeah, yeah sounds good Andy, Oh....investing pennies for it? Not backing his words up there.
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Online can't do "social" and "experiences". High streets need to move away from chain shops and towards enterprises which are less about aimlessly browsing and more about being a destination. Sadly, that probably means most high streets need redeveloping to some extent and we know how NIMBYish this country is.
- Sep 25
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Meanwhile if Rupert Lowe promised to spend £700 trillion making sure every house in Britain has its own Greggs by the end of his first hour in office, people here would be saying "Finally, a politician that gets what people want and has a clear plan to do it!"