Colonising Derry’s Empty Commercial Spaces

Take a quick stroll around the city centre (or anywhere else in the town for that matter) and you’ll be struck by just how many empty commercial spaces there are.

The regeneration strategy for the city aims to add more, by (rightfully in my opinion) helping to restore many of the Georgian and Victorian buildings that make up the town centre (the Northern Counties building which now houses the City of Culture office being one example) and the Ebrington site.

Now if you want to open a shop this is good news. Rents are cheap and its rumoured that some landlords are offering 2 year rent free periods to shift empty properties.

But for the rest of us, empty, shuttered shopfronts are something of a blight. It looks like the whole town is going out of business.

That said, Derry is not alone in this. Town centres across Britain and Ireland are suffering the same fate as shoppers head to out-of-town supermarkets and big box retailers and major ‘high street’ names congregate in shopping centres.

Short of opening another half dozen charity shops though, what can we do? Well, I propose an invasion.

Invasion of the Creative Types

I say that we give arts groups, community groups and events organisers access to these empty commercial spaces, sit back and see what inventive ideas they come up with.

Empty shop windows become galleries for our local talent. Shops on Shipquay Street, in the Craft Village and around Bishop Street become temporary event spaces for poetry readings, stand-up comedy and evening classes. Retail events, lasting days or weeks, curated by the city’s artists and artisans pop-up and then disappear again.

Successful short-term projects could potentially even ‘graduate’ into permanent installations and new businesses.

And the good news is that it’s not just my idea. The team behind the City of Culture bid are already looking at ex-factory sites as potential venues for large scale events in 2013. The proposed schedule for the year also includes ideas like the ‘Northern Lights’ festival, which will make use of ‘unused spaces and public realm using projections and light based installations’.

What we need to do is not just encourage this kind of creative use but actually make the process simple and start connecting the dots. There’s already a list of unused commercial spaces in the city, let’s make this available to groups who could use it. Moreover, let’s actively approach the owners of these spaces and encourage them to get involved – and ensure that this kind of use doesn’t affect the rates they pay.

On a national scale there’s an entire movement dedicated to just this kind of thing and even the previous government wanted in on the act.

Time perhaps, to simply make this happen. How much more vibrant a place could our city centre be becuase of it?