Manchester Arndale Has Record Year For Visitors

I like the Arndale. A much better experience than the Traffic Centre.

I like the Arndale too. It keeps all the kids who show up on Saturday afternoons in their 'best McKenzie gear' in one place.

It's a horrible place full of crap shops and poor people walking about aimlessly . Deansgate ,St Ann's square offers so much more in terms of architecture and a shopping experience.

The last ranter is clearly a bit mad. He thinks cities should be one dimensional, he thinks the Arndale is one dimensional. It isn't, it even has a bookshop with a coffeeshop inside. And in the food market a micro-brewer. Clearly he has never been to any multi-cultural European cities such as Antwerp or Amsterdam or Lyons and seen their 'poor people'. He should really go and live in Harrogate.

crisbyJanuary 10th 2013.

The Arndale has a cracking fishmonger too.

So Charlie, off to the Arndale this weekend ? High end dining for you in the food court! Then a spot of coffee in Waterstones , get a life ,get some fresh air walk round Manchester . Actually Harrogate very nice, Betty's tea rooms one of my favourites. We used to have Meng and Eckers but sadly they closed

ANONYMOUS This Afternoon at 12:47 PM.
I like the Arndale too. It keeps all the kids who show up on Saturday afternoons in their 'best McKenzie gear' in one place.

I wish the Emos in Cathedral Gardens would join them...

Anonymous I might just do that, never mind Charlie. Get a book and a beer in The Arndale, nip to the Northern Quarter for some lunch, then maybe visit the Cathedral or Chetham's, shoe schmooze in Edwards and then up to Harrogate, buy a retirement bungalow and go quietly into that good night. Sounds like a plan.

Lets not delude ourselves. The Arndale is a truly grim experience and a blight on the city centre. I shop in it regularly. But I hate it. I hate the way it severs so many streets preventing free movement across the city. I hate its dismal exterior. I hate its bland anodyne malls. I hate its name. I hate its black and white floor tiles. I hate the shops in there - too big, yet strangely too small and too busy to be comfortable to shop in.

Arndale, as one of your many reluctant customers, please do not congratulate yourself for being the only show in town. Believe me, when I have half a chance I go elsewhere.

These are historic arguments. Should the Arndale have been built as a great wall between High Street and Corporation Street? No. But that was thirty-forty years ago. Is it normal for cities to have large covered shopping centres? Yes. Is the northern half of the Arndale as good a mainstream shopping centre as any in the country? Yes. Well done Arndale I say.

clementine rileyJanuary 4th 2013.

should the Editor be engaging in the debate?

The Arndale could be worse. It's accessible by bus and tram. It's got a decent market where you can get a cheap curry for lunch and real ale. As a city centre resident without a car it's great to be able to get cheap fruit and veg in Aldi.

Obviously it's dominated by chain stores but there's the NQ and elsewhere for decent independent shops - somewhere the size of Manchester city centre has room for both.

The Arndale is depressing. The shopping experience is better in Liverpool nowadays and Leeds will be better when Trinity opens in a few months time. St Anns Square and King Street are devoid of decent shops because the Arndale sucks in all the footfall. I'd like to see some flagship stores on Deansgate, it could be like Oxford Street in London.

I wonder if the objection to the Arndale is its size or that it's enclosed. Can anyone really argue with having an enclosed mall in Manchester's sunny climate? If anything it can be an escape into the Arndale when Manchester's weather is doing it's finest/worst. Definitely the loss of the Arndale canopy along Market Street was a loss but at least it doesn't smell anymore with it's frequent rain lashings.

I don't know what it took to get Liverpool One as it is but I would imagine it took a lot of demolition and a lot of building to achieve it including numerous subteranean access roads, car parking and the like. I'm not knocking Liverpool 1 as I have enjoyed it but isn't it a bit much wiping out the Arndale to start all over again. Also isn't the yellow tile facade protected in some way?

What other stores could you expect to take space on Deansgate when there are units empty on St Ann's including the old Habitat store which is a decent size? Are there any large chains that could have a flagship store in Manchester that is larger than they're already existing stores? The only store I could think of would be John Lewis but they already have 2 branches in close proximity and where would they put themselves?

@JS These are not historic arguments. The city squandered two golden opportunities to put the Arndale's problems right. Once after the IRA bomb and once when the northern extension was developed. The latter was a particular shame because we allowed them to build over Canon Street, formerly a public right of way.

Liverpool built its new shopping centre around a rejuvenated Paradise Street. That scheme has been transformational for Liverpool in so many ways.

In Manchester laissez faire has bred a culture of accepting gratefully whatever developers serve up. We do not plan. We do not craft streets or squares that make the city an uplifting place to be. We do not demand the best. The sale / give away of Canon Street was a scandal, deserving of an FOI request. What did we get in return exactly? Where was the quid pro quo? The northern extension is possibly our greatest missed opportunity and totemic of much that is wrong with the city.

Ok, another article about footfall. When will we get to see the hard sales figures - is that too much to ask for?

If people stop buying things they don't really need and can't afford then our "economy" with collapse, so let's hope the hard sales figures are high.

Delighted with these numbers. Some have predicted the death of our city centre on a regular basis over the last twelve months and it is nice to see them proven wrong.

AnonymousJanuary 12th 2013.

Talk about complacent.

What about the death of King St/St Annes square?? Anyone can manipulate figures can't they?! i dont see it myself? footfall is different to whats being spent, i mostly browse in the Arndale only if im cutting through or early for an appointment otherwise too busy too intimidating, too expensive, I can't remember the last time i bought anything in that place! Then again im hardly of the Nike generation! Full of plastic zero nutrition takeaway food, cannot understand how its making money in this recession, the market bit is more original plus the fishmarket is great, but the rest of it im not too sure are the underclass/wealthy foreign students keeping it going on their (daddies) credit cards i wonder!!