Shops in Westfield, Bromley, Balham, East Ham, Hackney, Farringdon, Kingston, Wimbledon, Clapham Common, Ealing and Wandsworth are believed to be closing early as London prepares for a fourth night of violence. The Southside Shopping Centre in Wandsworth and Centre Court Shopping Centre in Wimbledon have already shut.
London has already suffered three nights of riots, spreading all across the capital following the death of a man shot by police in Tottenham.
Westfield shopping centre in Shepherds Bush is noted for its size: with a retail floor area of 150,000m² the equivalent of about 30 football pitches. It is said to be London’s largest shopping centre (overtaking the Centrale in Croydon), the third largest shopping centre in the United Kingdom (behind MetroCentre and Bluewater), and the largest urban area indoor shopping centre in Europe (as distinct from out-of-town centres).
Bluewater is a super-regional shopping centre, opened on 16 March 1999. It is located at Greenhithe in the borough of Dartford, near the M25 motorway in northwest Kent, England. It is owned by four major UK institutions. The centre is on a 240-acre plot in a former chalk quarry. It has a sales floor area of 154,000 min two levels, making it the second largest shopping centre in the UK after Gateshead’s MetroCentre. The floor plan is a triangular shape with 330 stores, including 3 anchors, 40 cafés and restaurants, and a 13-screen cinema. The centre employs 7,000 and serves over 27 million visitors a year.
A main rival is the Lakeside Shopping Centre and retail park some 9 miles away in West Thurrock, Essex.
The Brent Cross shopping centre was the first experiment in this style of shopping experience in the UK when it opened at Brent Cross in 1976 and it was initially constructed in an I shape parallel to the North Circular Road, with the two largest stores placed at either end. Suffering later from a rather dated look, subsequent expansion started in 1995 and saw the open parking areas to the north replaced by further shops, mid-market restaurants and multi-storey parking giving the present inverted T shape.
The original malls still retain a 1970s look, even though the shops have been modernised over the years. Despite its small size, the shopping centre has one of the largest incomes per unit area of retail space in the UK.