TRADERS ARE ‘HANGING ON BY FINGERNAILS’ IN GHOST TOWN
T ONYPANDY’S high street used to look like any other bustling high street.
The town at the heart of the Rhondda used to have people queuing out the doors of its shops and you’d have to be careful not to bump into anyone as you walked through the throng.
Running a business back then was a lucrative career – but now it’s a constant struggle.
In October 2017, our reporters visited Tonypandy after it was handed the unwanted accolade of Wales’ worst shopping district.
Now more than a year later, the town has been branded the fourth worst retail location in the UK and the worst in Wales.
Commercial Finance experts ABC Finance have been investigating where the UK has been most affected by the decline of the high street, based on shop vacancy rates and Tonypandy came in fourth place in the UK, the only Welsh high street to feature in the list.
Speaking on Thursday, Mike Penrose, who has run Dunraven Shoe Repairs for 40 years, said: “If nothing changes they can build a concrete wall across Porth and flood the lot. Because it’ll be a ghost town.
“It’s a ghost town now, but we’re just hanging on by our fingernails now and unless they do something we can’t go on like this.”
With high business rates, dwindling footfall and a lack of support from local government, many business owners and residents feel like they’ve been left behind.
And on a wet, blustery Thursday it’s not hard to see why Mike isn’t optimistic about the future of his hometown.
At lunchtime, when most high streets should be bustling, there are few people wandering up and down Dunraven Street, now flanked by several shuttered shops.
Mike said: “If this was a steel industry or a coal industry, we’d be on strike now. I think it’s like hun- dreds of thousands of jobs in Britain that’ve gone in the retail sector, and it’s really starting to hit home now.”
It wasn’t always like this for business owners in Tonypandy.
The former coal mining town was once one of the busiest in the Rhondda, and some of the shopkeepers still surviving and residents can remember a very different time.
Founder of community group Improving Tonypandy, Wendy Allsop, 55, said: “Back when I can remember you did all your shopping in Pandy. You could get everything you needed.
“Now, you can’t even buy men’s clothes on the high street.”
When Mike first started his shoe repair business he had four members of staff and became so successful he could expand to 16 members of staff with shops across South Wales.
Now with fewer and fewer people visiting the high street, Mike is sometimes left waiting for a single customer to walk through the door.
Mike said: “Back 40 years ago you couldn’t walk up the street. You had to dodge people and cars to get past.
“There were four cinemas here, now we haven’t got any. The library is just about hanging on.
“There were four of us working here, we’d have shoes up to our eyeballs. The high street would be chockablock.
“I feel we’ve been let down, totally let down. I don’t want to point the finger at this government, it’s been all governments. Long term.”
Now just 40 years later some traders struggle to make more than £100 in a week.
Wahid Saraj recently set up a business on Dunraven Street after moving from London.
Since opening his ornaments and jewellery shop around three weeks ago, Wahid said he’s not made more than £50.
Wahid said: “Nobody comes. If it continues like this we’ll have to go back soon.
“Greggs, the g gambling shop and the charity shop do OK and that’s it.”
Even Mike, who once employed 16 people, said he struggles to make much more than £100 a week.
Speaking on Thursday, he said: “I’m not doing OK. Do you know how much money I took yesterday? It’s law in Britain isn’t it that you have to pay minimum wage – I didn’t take minimum wage yesterday.
“I’ve taken £8 this morning. This week I haven’t taken £100.”
Shop owners are now even more worried about the future after two banks announced they would close on Dunraven Street.
Barclays and Santander are both set to shut up shop in 2019, getting rid of two of the main attractions on the high street.
Wendy said: “A lot of the footfall in the town has been people going to the bank and then going shopping afterwards.
“People just don’t understand the geography up here in the Valleys. They might say that the next bank is just 3.4 miles away, but up here that’s a difficult journey for a lot of people.”
For some the situation isn’t all doom and gloom.
Craig Griffiths has worked at Hilda’s Florist on Dunraven Street for around 30 years and has seen how trade has declined – but says traders shouldn’t look back.
Craig, 45, from Tonyrefail, said: “We are very busy these days. With our business we take phone orders, deliveries and online.
“You can buy from us without ever having to come into the shop, so a quieter high street doesn’t affect us as much.
“We are in a better position now than we have ever been. You are now able to park pretty much right outside most of the shops.”
Despite his own business, which he’s run for around 30 years, ticking along, Craig is still realistic that the area needs help.
He said: “The high business rates do make it a very unattractive proposition. That’s the main issue.
“Can it get any worse? I don’t think it can. Our saviour is the small independent businesses.
“I think it’s just changing times. You just have to evolve, it’s pointless looking back.”
The area has already seen a number of recent changes, including allowing cars to drive down Dunraven Street.
The scheme was discussed with traders in 2017 and the work has since been carried out, but some traders say it’s contributed to the decline, with fewer people walking past their shopfronts.
Yako Yahia ran a restaurant on