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As consumer habits evolve the role of purpose-built shopping centers is being severely tested. The phrase “dead mall syndrome” is now frequently used in North America and parts of Europe to describe shopping centers facing obsolescence. In this paper, we make purpose-built shopping centers in large UK cities our focus and consider the extent to which “dead mall syndrome” and “de-malling” are occurring on the UK’s city center high streets. Using a new dataset, we find that shopping centers are facing high levels of vacancy and can no longer rely on the rental income that used to flow from retailers. Tenancies are also more difficult to sustain in older enclosed shopping centers than in newer open-air shopping centers. This has forced some operators to adopt radical “de-malling” measures that focus on the redevelopment of former shopping center sites into mixed-use urban quarters. This approach has been aided by flexible UK planning policies that enable shop owners to convert redundant retail space into alternative new uses. We argue, however, that a more managed approach is necessary to ensure these urban transformations achieve a sustainable fix to the “crisis on the high street” in large UK city centers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the 1990s the UK's city centre high streets have been losing market share to out-of-town shopping and e-retailing. The shocks of the Global Financial Crisis and COVID-19 have hastened this and precipitated widespread store closures. The experience economy is increasingly promoted as a means to avert the 'death of the high street', and this prompts our study of its evolution. An exploration of the literature reveals the experience economy to be an interconnected phenomenon focused on the creation of a memorable event that elicits a sensory response via multi-dimensional innovation and design. Using this to guide our empirical work, we undertake a comparative mixed method longitudinal case study of five UK city centres. We initially chart the changing manifestations of experience uses before analysing supporting interviews and observations that reveal three interconnected layers of the experience economy: in-store commercial experiences; leisure and entertainment-orientated adaptations to shopping centres and department stores; and the wider regeneration of the public realm. Implications for city centre management are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper considers how planning authorities can achieve urban design ambitions in the context of deepening neoliberalism and fiscal austerity. Based upon a case study of West Dunbartonshire, Scotland, the paper reveals the innovative steps taken by the local authority to introduce new design governance tools in the face of significant resource constraints. The paper critically examines the role that the private sector plays in the governance of design and argues for a reconceptualisation of design governance that more rigorously attends to the challenge of delivering well-designed places in the public interest. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the formal instruments of design governance and the urban design decision-making environment in Chinese cities. It identifies Shenzhen, Shanghai and Nanjing as three cities pioneering in design-led planning in China and critically evaluates their approaches using a series of 'best practice' principles for design review and development management. The findings are based on 20 semi-structured interviews with key stakeholders, a review of their design portfolios, and an analysis of urban design policies and plans. The paper identifies the progress made with design governance in the three 'pioneer' cities as well as the challenges associated with adopting more design-sensitive planning practice. It concludes with four recommendations for Chinese cities. These focus on foregrounding sense of place in city-wide urban design visions, raising the quality of design guidance and codes, more effectively coordinating regulations produced by different government departments and agencies, and widening opportunities for public participation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Androgens regulate important processes involved in the normal development and function of the human and rodent prostate glands. Here we report the isolation and characterization of a new androgen-regulated gene, designated WDR19, that encodes repeating sequence motifs found in the WD-repeat family of proteins. The WD repeat is a conserved domain of approximately 40 amino acids that is typically bracketed by glycine–histidine and tryptophan–aspartic acid (WD) dipeptides. WD-repeat proteins are a large group of structurally related proteins that participate in a wide range of cellular functions, including transmembrane signaling, mRNA modification, vesicle formation, and vesicular trafficking. The WDR19 gene comprises 36 exons and is located on chromosome 4p15–4p11. The predicted protein contains six WD repeats, a clathrin heavy-chain repeat, and three transmembrane domains. Sequence analysis reveals that the WDR19 gene is conserved from Caenorhabditis elegans to human. WDR19 is expressed in normal and neoplastic prostate epithelium as demonstrated by RNA in situ hybridization and is regulated by androgenic hormones. WDR19 transcripts exhibit alternative splicing in which two isoforms appear to be prostate restricted, a property that could be exploited for designing diagnostic or therapeutic strategies for prostate carcinoma. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The retail sector is experiencing unprecedented change, from ongoing shifts in shopping behaviour to retailer rationalisation and business failure. Internationally, this is impacting the crucial economic and social role of many highly developed city centres. This paper examines how key stakeholders have responded to the challenges of adapting city centres for the future. Empirically, the paper draws on a series of repurposing schemes across five case study cities. Conceptually, theories of assemblage are used as an analytical framework to understand how heterogeneous networks combine to repurpose city centres. The paper makes a distinctive contribution by revealing symbiosis between mixed uses that challenge traditional high street norms, and suggests that harnessing common desires could underpin productive shared governance and support business communities' efforts to bring vibrancy and enhance resilience. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Design students are increasingly seeking precedent information through web-based digital archives of design cases. Little is known, however, about the use, relative merits or opportunities of digital cases as a knowledge source for design students. This paper uses a study of web-based urban design reference tools to examine new opportunities for using precedents in urban design. The research includes focus groups, content analysis of student work and an auto-ethnography by one of the authors to examine student use of the reference tools in 3 urban design studios in planning and landscape architecture. Students used 3-D digital models of precedents to review, replicate, revise, reshape and recreate elements of urban design in an environment of accelerated learning. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

This paper explores the inter-connections between property use diversity, change of use, and the adaptive capacity within urban retailing systems. The retailing centres of five UK case study cities, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Hull, Liverpool, and Nottingham, are examined over a twenty-year period using original databases on property use and geospatial mapping techniques to employ property use richness and diversity metrics in a novel manner. Overall, the analysis finds property use richness has generally risen as comparison retailing and financial services have contracted, to be replaced by hospitality, leisure, and residential uses. However, this re-balancing has not been even across retailing centres and is outstripped by rising vacancies. The study also reveals spatial variation in change of use and use diversity and richness as retailing centres slowly adapt, implying that future policymaking should focus on creating more resilient, mixed use city centres as an alternative to the single use retail high streets of the past. • Links administrative and commercial datasets to create novel databases of property use. • The variety of shops and services increases across all five core shopping areas studied. • Variation occurs in sectors that have grown or contracted, aligning with changes in consumer behaviours. • The speed and scale of adaptation fails to match the rapidly evolving retailing environment. • The timing and duration of the adaptive cycle phases are centre-specific, and shaped by local market dynamics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]