‘I could cry when I see what’s happened, the town has lost its soul’
ROCHDALE Exchange Shopping Centre is full of Christmas cheer. Prickly garlands hang from the walls, glistening green fairy lights span the ceiling and a mock-up of a winter wonderland scene attracts the gaze of passers-by just beginning to find their Christmas spirit.
However, it all seems rather in vain. Most of the shops inside are either empty or sparsely populated, with many simply using it as cut-through to reach the Riverside shopping centre a few hundred metres away.
Now, just a year after it was last purchased, the Exchange Shopping Centre is up for sale.
But some locals fear the town centre has already lost its soul.
Shoppers walking through the Exchange shared their thoughts with the Observer on what they think of their town centre, and how they would like to see the shopping centre change.
The complex is to be auctioned off on December 12 with a guide price of £3.5m. Current owners Martin Property Group have put the 5.9 hectare site up for auction only a year after purchasing the 284,000 sq ft centre. The Exchange houses over 40 tenants as well as parking for 732 cars.
One shopper from Rochdale, Bernard Ayres, 73, said: “It’s very poor and a lot of shops are closing down.
“They’ve built new shops, but it’s not taken off at all, I actually shop five miles away in Middleton, but my bank’s down here, that why I come.
“I could actually cry when I see what’s happened to Rochdale, there’s a lot of poverty around now which wasn’t there before and it’s just lost its soul, it’s run down.”
Some shoppers say they feel forced to go to other shopping centres to find want they want.
Kathleen Diggle, 85, from Rochdale, said: “Well, if this goes, we’ll have nothing up here. There’s nothing on Yorkshire Street, they’re all charity shops. If I do my shopping I usually go to Bury or Manchester.
“I don’t think they’ll redevelop it, but if they do, they should make it like Bury, because people aren’t coming into Rochdale now.”
Concern for the Exchange Shopping Centre was echoed by John and Stephanie Wroe, both from Rochdale, who said they “don’t come often to the shopping centre.”
Mr Wroe, 75, said: “There’s not much we want to buy in here, to be honest. The only thing that I come in for is for the opticians.
“You’ve got almost two separate shopping centres and this one never looks busy, so I’m not surprised that it’s gone up for sale.”
Mrs Wroe, 72, pointed out the empty Wheatsheaf shopping centre and suggested the land Rochdale Exchange sits on could be put to better use.
She said: “I’m not sure we need the shops any more, I’m sure the people who have shops would argue that they do, unless you can attract big names,
because all the big names have gone down to the Riverside.”
The pair said most people shop online these days and suggested a better use of shopping space would be creating a through area with more cafes and restaurants to help revive the centre.
“There’s not much in the way of cafes in Rochdale, well not that we know of,” Mrs Wroe said.
“But it’s not somewhere we come out to in the evening. There’s a feeling that it’s not necessarily safe in the evening perhaps, as well.”
Many residents primarily wanted to see the eventual new owners restore the indoor market, that was closed in 2015, to its place in the shopping complex.
Patricia Calland, 43, from Rochdale, said: “They should have kept the market for a start because no one goes down to the bottom market, and if they brought the market back in at cheaper rent rate then they would have more shoppers.
“No one wants to go downtown at the bottom end where the new builds are because the parking is pricier and there’s less shops down there and they’re all pretty generic.”
She added: “It’s just what are they going to do with it really because Rochdale’s not the best town anyway, it’s got a bad reputation.
“What they need to do is regenerate it a bit more. Ideally, they should bring back the market, that’s the best thing they should do.”
Mrs Wroe echoed this sentiment as she said: “I think it was the most foolish thing they ever did was to take the market away from here. I think if you made this an indoor market we’d have a lot more customers, because there’s a lot of through trade and it’s perfect for a market, you’re standing out in the freezing cold. People don’t want to go there, this could be an artisan regular market.”
However not all shoppers feel dejected by the shopping centre.
Mokxy Ali, 40, from Oldham, described the complex as ‘convenient’ and said he would be ‘angry if the owners make it into something other than this.’
Mr Ali said: “I went to Whsmith for a little book for my daughter which she wanted, there’s none in Oldham, I find it convenient.
“They’ve got every shop, people don’t need to travel, basically I think it’s good, but if they’re putting it up for sale the owners might make it into offices like in Oldham they have. People from Rochdale, they might not know it’s up for sale, if they do find out they might be angry.”
Auctioneers Allsop described the location as a prominent town centre scheme situated in the heart of the town centre with frontages onto multiple roads.
Well-known tenants include Costa, Poundland, Iceland, Holland & Barrett, Greggs and Home Bargains.
Reports from previous sales showed the centre had been worth £19m back in 2013.
Rochdale Exchange is not the only property being relinquished by Martin Property Group. Last month the company put Glovers Walk in Yeovil up for sale with an equally low guide price of £1.75m.
Councillor Danny Meredith, cabinet member for regeneration and housing at Rochdale Borough Council, said: “The Rochdale Exchange shopping centre is an important part of Rochdale town centre and we’ve worked with the current owners to help diversify and improve the offer to ensure it can adapt in the face of a changing retail market.
“This has included the recent conversion of an empty unit into a health clinic, which will be opening in the spring.
“In recent years, we’ve seen increased footfall across the town centre, which will continue with the delivery of new homes, leisure opportunities and a programme of family friendly events. Going forward, the Exchange Shopping Centre site will become even more important, with its proximity to Rochdale Town Hall, which will soon re-open following a multi-million pound restoration, a major selling point.
“We will work positively with any new owner to ensure that the exchange continues to play an important role in the area as part of Rochdale town centre’s ongoing £400m regeneration programme.”