High street footfall drops by nearly half

Tuesday 28 July 2020

The number of people visiting town is down by 43% compared to last year, new figures show.

116,239 visitors were counted in King Street in mid-July, with the busiest day being Saturday 18 July with 20,570 visitors.

Those figures are down from 212,553 visitors in 2019 and 213,337 in 2018, according to the Weekly Footfall Report for King Street compiled by the Chamber of Commerce.

So far this year, footfall has gone down by 43.3% compared to 2019.

Pictured: The number of visitors has been increasing since lockdown restrictions were eased further.

Footfall has consistently been down by around 43% since lockdown restrictions were eased further and more businesses allowed to open in early June. 

However, the number of weekly visitors has been increasing although it is not yet back to its pre-lockdown level. 

The first week of June, it stood at 83,812. It then jumped to 105,512 two weeks later.

The opening of borders on 3 July seem to have had little impact on the number of visitors coming to town at the weekend.

Pictured: The opening of borders appears to have had little impact on the number of people coming to town.

On Saturday 28 June, 20,801 people were counted in town, the following week there were 20,548.

Meanwhile, the weekly footfall has increased by just over 4,600 since borders opened. 

The decreasing footfall is in line with what towns in the UK are experiencing.

According to the figures, footfall is down by 46.2% in the UK.