Towards a Retailess City? A Comparative Analysis of the Retail Desertification between a Global and a Local Commercial Strips in Barcelona

Abstract

The relationships between the circuits of the urban economy and retail desertification are analysed based on two retail strips in Barcelona: Passeig de Gràcia, a central hub with global reach, and the Sants-Creu Coberta strip, which responds to the demand for consumption on a local, everyday scale. The hypothesis is that the relationships between these circuits and retail desertification behave differently depending on their relative position in the city with respect to consumption flows. This is tested with a one-to-one analysis of the uses of ground floor premises in both strips for 2016 and 2021, using data from the Commercial Censuses of the Barcelona City Council and Barcelona Provincial Council, respectively. Each ground floor premises is classified as superior, lower or vacant, which allows the process to be mapped from 2016 to 2021 for each of the premises. The article provides, first and foremost, an original systematisation of the behaviour, relationships, and observed forms between the circuits and desertification, and secondly, it demonstrates the differential behaviour of these relationships and forms through case studies, indicating that retail desertification is the main cause of economic and landscape change.

Keywords

• urban economy circuits
• retail desertification
• Barcelona