Or perhaps bring in the bulldozers and create a park/piazza. Give residents somewhere nice to go and socialise and that encourages exercise and helps foster community spirit. Many town centres are just shopping centres so have limited appeal. Turning the shops into houses doesn't add much appeal (or at least only to a handful). I've been saying for a while now that bricks and mortar shopping should be allowed to die back but I think there's an opportunity in a lot of cases for a complete re-think of what a town centre should be.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
