During his apprenticeship in 1961, when trams still
rolled along the famous tributary to Bondi beach, there were four department
stores within three blocks of Hyde Park. "You had Buckingham's, Winn's,
Brashs, Mark Foys," he fondly recollects. "There were famous quality shops
like Nicholas Seafood, and people would come from all over Sydney. You
weren't hassled for your change by people on the street. Now the place is
just awful."So tatty has Oxford Street
become that some of Mr Jones's clients, who include eminent barristers and
judges, ask him to measure them at their city offices: "I think they just
don't want to be seen here any more."
A great deal has been written of the demise of
Sydney's best-known thoroughfare, but virtually nothing of what can be done
to revive it. As long as shop owners, their clientele and residents
entertain so many different notions about where it all went wrong, the
solution may continue to evade them all.
The City of Sydney Council last year spent $24
million widening the footpaths, and on Monday is expected to approve the
development of a food-and-retail emporium in a row of heritage buildings
between Riley and Crown streets. It has also offered a 50 per cent reduction
in the cost of outdoor dining licences to struggling eateries.
But all the while, boutique businesses, broken by
the exodus of trade to Frank Lowy's Westfield megalopolis in Bondi Junction,
continue to move out en masse. "For lease" signs dot the streetscape,
obscuring from casual glances piles of sodden newspapers, half-empty bottles
and other trash dumped in vacant shops.
From the reopened Chauvel cinema up to Centennial
Park, once thought by discerning Sydney ladies to be the city's premier
shopping drag, an influx of "cheap and nasty shops, mostly shoe shops, is
taking place. I counted 15 in a few blocks the other day," sniffs Maggie
Bailey, manager of Yves Delorme linen shop. For top-end clothing labels such
as Armani and Max Mara, shoppers still prefer Westfield, where they can park
free for two hours.
Not so long ago building owners on Oxford Street
could demand as much as $100,000 in key money from prospective tenants, so
fierce was the competition for spaces. Now some of them are carving as much
as 40 per cent off the rent in their desperation to fill the holes. The
Melbourne men's shoe chain Batsanis is one operator that arrived in recent
months to capitalise on lower rents, but the store manager, Mary Theodorou,
says she was surprised at "how much of a ghost town the place is on
weekdays. We survive entirely on weekend takings. I used to love shopping
here, but most of the places I shopped at are gone.
"One really big thing is no one wants to park here
because there are parking police every single day without fail giving out
fines."
Afternoon parking is perhaps the flashpoint issue
among small businesses. Bill Wilson, owner of Paddington Fresh Foods, lost
"$1000 a week when they made it a clearway from 5pm, then another $1000 when
they brought it forward to 3pm. It's just greed by the council, and
stupidity."
At the lower end of the street, where wild Mardi
Gras celebrations lent the street a colourful, anything-can-happen
atmosphere in the early '80s, the situation is apparently worse. Not only
are a third of all available leasehold spaces vacant, but the exuberantly
camp quality that turned the area into an international gay capital has
faded. In its place is a trashy, washed-out aesthetic that seems to work as
a beacon to straight young men who enjoy standing in nightclub queues.
"People in the gay community call it the 'de-gaying'
of Oxford Street," says Stacy Farrar, editor of The Sydney Star Observer,
whose office sits above the junction of Oxford and Brisbane streets. "You
see huge queues of straight people outside the nightclubs. And the number of
nightclubs on the street is changing its daytime face. There are less
businesses open during the day; there's less foot traffic."
Despite assurances from police that the incidence
of assault has remained steady in recent years, Ms Farrar says that
"anecdotally at least, it seems homophobic attacks are on the rise … Just
walking down the street, if you look a bit gay, you can get targeted."
Although the council is developing a safety
strategy and plans to install seven closed-circuit cameras, Phil Wharton,
chairman of the Darlinghurst Business Partnership, feels that the council
"doesn't have a long-term security strategy".
"One of the biggest problems around here for
businesses is crime. It simply drives away foot traffic. People are afraid
to come and shop here. So you've got 'To let' signs everywhere - and let me
tell you, empty shops only beget more empty shops."
Mr Jones, who says his suits are "too upmarket now
for Oxford Street", believes people are forgetting the thoroughfare
was in decline long before Westfield appeared on the scene, and well before
parking and rent became a scourge for small businesses.
"It's been going bad for decades. To be honest it
started in the '70s, but it just seems to have accelerated really rapidly in
the last few years. It's as if these recent developments have tipped it over
the edge," he says.
As he finishes speaking, right on cue, a young
couple stumble past looking irritable and tired. "Oh, I give up," the woman
exclaims to her partner in frustration. "Let's just forget it and go to
Bondi Junction."
