What We Know About Aberdeen's Plan to Save Its High Street

The Marks & Spencer that anchored Aberdeen's Union Street for 80 years closed in August 2026, leaving a boarded-up storefront with the ghost outline of its old sign still visible above the door, according to BBC News. It sits among the empty units that now pockmark what locals call the Granite Mile, once the retail heart of northeast Scotland.

Aberdeen's city council has responded with what BBC business correspondent Emma Simpson describes as a hands-on push to fill vacant shops, bring long-neglected upper floors back into use, and pour tens of millions of pounds into remaking the city centre as a destination rather than just a shopping strip. The effort includes a new indoor food and drink market and a major redevelopment of the seafront, part of a broader bet on what planners call the "experience economy."

Why is Aberdeen's high street struggling?

The pattern is familiar across Britain: retail was hit first by out-of-town shopping centers, then by online commerce, according to BBC News. Marie Sim, a lifelong Aberdeen resident, told the BBC she now visits Union Street mainly to catch a bus elsewhere. "There's nothing to shop for now… it's horrendous," she said.

How bad is the vacancy problem nationally?

One in eight properties on British high streets currently sit vacant, a figure that has stayed stubbornly high for years, according to data from property and retail analytics firm Green Street cited by the BBC.

What is making high streets hard to fix?

Jackie Sadek, a former government adviser on urban regeneration who has spent nearly four decades in the field, told the BBC that fractured ownership is one of the biggest obstacles. Shops and buildings are often held by dozens of separate landlords, sometimes through offshore companies or layered corporate structures, each with different priorities, which slows decision-making and complicates large-scale redevelopment. "If there was a silver bullet, it would have been fired years ago," Sadek said.

Even where empty units are available, finding a tenant willing to take on an aging building that needs modernizing is a separate challenge, the BBC reported. Rising costs, including higher employment expenses and business rates, have added pressure on the businesses that remain, while footfall on many high streets has been in long-term decline.

Who else is pushing to revive town centres?

Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham, who has made a focus on "place" central to his political identity, has argued that town centers should become "symbols of Britain's renaissance," according to the BBC. He is described as the latest in a line of politicians across party lines who have tried for years to reverse high street decline.

What would it take for a turnaround to work?

The BBC frames Aberdeen's approach as an open question rather than a proven fix: tackling fragmented ownership, modernizing outdated buildings, and giving people reasons beyond shopping to visit are all part of the strategy, but the report does not claim the plan has yet reversed the city's fortunes. Vacant, graffitied storefronts create what the BBC calls a vicious circle, discouraging shoppers and investment alike, which is the cycle Aberdeen's spending is meant to interrupt.

Whether tens of millions of pounds in public investment can outpace decades of retail decline, in a city where the flagship department store shut this year, remains the test the rest of Britain's high streets are watching.

Read the original reporting at BBC News.